On the Nuremberg Toy Fair Graupner is back, with their new Graupner FPV drone line-up. On the booth in Nuremberg we had the chance to talk to Graupner’s CEO Hannes Runknagel about their product range of drones and multirotors (full interview video below). A brief look at the company’s history: Graupner has over 80 years of heritage when it comes to the model hobby. Founded in 1930 in Kirchheim (Germany) Graupner started with toy animals and soon expanded their product range mostly to small airplane models and later also RC electronics. At its peak the company had a € 40 M annual revenue in the 2007 but faced then hard times which the fast rise of asian competition in the hobby sector. In 2013 the company filed for bankrupcy. The insolvency estate was bought by the South Korean company SR Inc. who later renamed themselves into Graupner.
Graupner’s new focus on electronics and multicopters
Now with a reduced product range the company grows again and besides the continuation in focussing on premium RC electronics they now expand into quadcopters. With currently three quadcopters the product line-up in this segment is still very small. But Hannes Runknagel promised that there will be a bunch of new Graupner multirotor products released in 2016. Currently, two sub-segments within the multirotor market is being served: The Alpha 250Q Race is a FPV race copter that suits well into the popular 250-sized FPV class.
The Graupner FPV racing League
Also, Graupner has announced on the Nuremberg Toy Fair to be main sponsor for the newly founded German FPV racing League. The all new 3D Copter Alpha 300Q is aims for customers who want to develop and expand their 3D flying skills into the multirotor segment. Especially the super smooth flight controller reactions of the 300Q empowers the model to do amazing 3D figures which most of regular multicopter pilots have never seen before. We are looking forward to see more drones from Graupner this year. Stay tuned!
