ALEXANDRIA, Va., June 12 -- United States Patent no. 12,296,981, issued on May 13, was assigned to Skydio Inc. (San Mateo, Calif.).

"Automated docking of unmanned aerial vehicle" was invented by Yevgeniy Kozlenko (Mountain View, Calif.), Jack Zhu (San Mateo, Calif.), Gareth Cross (San Carlos, Calif.), Teodor Tomic (Redwood City, Calif.), Adam Bry (Redwood City, Calif.) and Abraham Galton Bachrach (Emerald Hills, Calif.).

According to the abstract* released by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office: "Described herein are systems for automated docking of an unmanned aerial vehicle. For example, some systems include a landing surface configured to hold an unmanned aerial vehicle; a box configured to enclose the landing surface in a first arrange...