Update, August 21: This article was published August 18 under the headline “HOVERAir VERSA Clears FCC For US Sale While DJI Stays Blocked,” based on HOVERAir’s own statement that the VERSA held FCC certification and on an equipment authorization that appeared in the FCC database under the company’s grantee code. The FCC has since told DroneXL that the certification was granted in error, has been set aside, and has been removed from the public database. The article has been rewritten. The agency’s full statement appears below.
The FCC has ordered HOVERAir to stop importing, marketing and selling the VERSA in the United States, and says the equipment authorization the company pointed to when it opened Indiegogo pre-orders on August 18 should never have been issued.
In a statement provided to DroneXL, an FCC spokesperson said the certification was granted erroneously, has been set aside, and has been pulled from the agency’s public database. The spokesperson said the Commission is weighing further action against HOVERAir for what it described as an apparently willful violation of the Covered List rules.
The reversal lands four days into a crowdfunding campaign that has already cleared its funding goal, and it leaves backers who paid on the strength of that certification holding a device the agency says cannot lawfully be sold to them.
The FCC Says Both Halves Of The VERSA Are Covered
The agency’s position is that neither configuration escapes the Covered List. The camera by itself counts as a prohibited UAS critical component produced in a foreign country, and once the Flight Kit is attached the product becomes a foreign-produced UAS. The full statement, attributable to an FCC spokesperson:
“Importing, marketing, or selling this device in the United States is a violation of U.S. law, and the FCC has directed HoverAir to cease any such activity immediately. The device in question is on the FCC’s Covered List: the Versa camera alone is a prohibited UAS critical component produced in a foreign country and, when the Flight Kit is included, the device falls under the ban on UAS produced in a foreign country. The certification for this device was granted erroneously and has been set aside by the FCC and removed from our public database. The FCC is considering further action against HoverAir for apparently willfully violating the FCC’s Covered List rules. Finally, the FCC is sending guidance to all Telecommunications Certification Bodies to strengthen their due diligence of applications to ensure they comply with their legal obligation not to certify equipment on the FCC’s Covered List.”
The last sentence reaches well past this one company. Telecommunications Certification Bodies are the private labs the FCC accredits to issue equipment authorizations on its behalf, and the agency is telling every one of them that a grant slipped through that should have been refused.
ZeroZero Sought Certification For The Camera Alone
The workaround is now documented. ZeroZero Robotics applied for authorization covering the camera system rather than the complete aircraft, as The Verge established this week, and its marketing never uses the words drone or UAS. The spec sheet calls the VERSA an intelligent self-flying camera.
Asked about the ban, ZeroZero marketing director Anita Facundo told The Verge the product was “in full compliance with the applicable regulatory requirements” for the configuration sold to US customers. Gizmodo reported the same framing, noting the propeller cages were treated as an accessory rather than as part of an aircraft.
The FCC has now rejected that reading in the plainest terms available to it. A camera built to dock into a flight module is a UAS critical component whether or not the module ships in the same box.
HOVERAir Has A Second Campaign Facing Refunds
DroneXL covered the VERSA reveal on August 4, when the company had not said whether it would seek US authorization at all. The answer turned out to be yes, through a route the FCC now says was never available to it in the first place.
This is the second HOVERAir crowdfunding campaign in twelve months to collide with the same rule. The waterproof AQUA launched globally in May with the US excluded after the company failed to secure authorization before the FCC added all foreign-produced drones and their critical components to the Covered List on December 22, 2025. More than 1,800 backers who had put in over $2 million were offered refunds instead of hardware.
US backers of the VERSA campaign are now in the position AQUA backers occupied last winter, with one difference that cuts against them. The AQUA never had a certification to lose. The VERSA had one, and the agency took it back.
The Specs Still Stand Even If The Sale Does Not
HOVERAir lists 230 grams, 4K video at 60 frames per second in 10-bit HDR, a 3-axis mechanical gimbal, up to 14 minutes of flight, and a top speed of 22 mph (36 km/h). None of that is in dispute, and none of it is what the FCC objected to.
The Verge reported a 1/1.3-inch sensor. Level 5 wind resistance tops out around 24 mph (39 km/h), the same rating 51 Drones found workable but gust-sensitive on the X1 PRO MAX across seven months of testing. At 230 grams the VERSA also sits under the FAA’s 250-gram registration threshold, which was always a separate question from the FCC one and remains unaffected by this week’s action.
The Indiegogo campaign opened worldwide on August 18 and passed its funding goal within a day. HOVERAir had pointed to a fall 2026 retail release and a press preview on September 3 ahead of IFA Berlin.
DroneXL’s Take
I got this one wrong on Tuesday, and the correction matters more than the original story did. I published a piece arguing the Covered List screens for filing dates rather than security risk, and I used the VERSA’s certification as the evidence for it.
The certification was a mistake by a certification body, not a policy outcome. My argument rested on a fact that was not a fact, and I owe readers that plainly rather than buried in an update line.
What I will not walk back is the underlying objection. Look at what the FCC has now confirmed: a private lab issued a grant it should have refused, nobody at the agency caught it until a Chinese manufacturer had banked crowdfunding money from American backers, and the fix is a memo asking labs to try harder. That is not a screen. A rule enforced by press statement three days after the fact, on a product that four major outlets had already told readers was legal to buy, is a rule that is not working as designed. American backers are the ones eating the loss, again, and they are the same people locked out when DJI’s Osmo Pocket 4P launched globally on July 30.
HOVERAir does not come out of this clean either. The company built a product that separates into two pieces, sought certification for one piece, and marketed the pair. Calling the propeller cage an accessory was a legal theory, and the company tested it with other people’s money. The FCC’s word for that is willful.
The guidance to Telecommunications Certification Bodies is the part to watch. If the agency follows through, the next few months should produce more set-aside grants, because it is unlikely the VERSA is the only device that got through this way. Whether any of that reaches HOVERAir as a fine, and whether backers see refunds before the campaign closes, are the two open questions I would put to the company today.
Sources: FCC spokesperson statement provided to DroneXL, The Verge, Gizmodo, HOVERAir, Indiegogo
Correction: An earlier version of this article, published August 18, reported that the HOVERAir VERSA held valid FCC certification for sale in the United States. The FCC has since told DroneXL that the certification was granted in error and has been set aside. The article has been rewritten and retitled.
DroneXL uses automated tools to support research and source retrieval. All reporting and editorial perspectives are by Haye Kesteloo.
