Catalonia at the vanguard of drone development?

UAVs in Catalonia are highly ranked (4 out of the top 10 worldwide as per one research study). Reasons?

• Catalonia has extensive drone history (since the 1980’s)
• They have the BCN Drone Center (a specialist drone center with 2,500 hectares of segregated airspace for drone testing)
• Accommodating laws (allowing UAVs of up to 25 kg to fly outdoors outside of cities and built up neighborhoods to height of 120 meters and withing 500 m of its pilot)
• A government sponsored CataloniaSmartDrones working group (comprised of 25 companies and 16 organizations, including universities and research groups, and all working together on making the region drone-friendly)

The original article can be found here: http://www.zdnet.com/article/come-fly-with-me-why-catalonia-is-really-seeing-drones-take-off/