When you hear “delivery drone,” you probably think of a quadcopter lugging six or eight pounds across a handful of miles. But Drone Delivery Canada is testing a much bigger bird. It can haul 400 pounds of cargo up to 124 miles.
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An experimental service from drone delivery company Wing in Virginia is humming along. The company says that its volume of deliveries has more than doubled since the service began on October 18. Wing hasn’t disclosed the total number of deliveries, but the growth is a positive sign.
The US and Europe develop a lot of technology. But they aren’t always the first to enjoy it. Case in point: San Francisco-based drone delivery company Zipline. Back in 2016, the company began transporting blood supplies with fixed-wing drones to rural medical clinics around Rwanda. Zipline has since made thousands of medical deliveries in Rwanda and has also expanded to Ghana in West Africa. Only now is the company bringing drone delivery to the US.
Chinese car company Geely announced on March 23rd it will complete new online deliveries using delivery drones to ensure human-to-human contact is avoided. New owners will be able to receive their car keys via a delivery drone that will drop them off right your door.
UPS drone delivery subsidiary UPS Flight Forward (UPSFF) today said it would collaborate with German drone-maker Wingcopter to develop the next generation of package delivery drones for a variety of use cases in the United States and internationally.
Matternet has launched its new drone station with a new design and direct integration with hospital systems. Matternet hopes to have seamless drone deliveries between hospitals and pharmacies with their suppliers.
Manna drone delivery has partnered with Just Eat food delivery platform to bring drone deliveries to the people of Dublin. Manna’s delivery drones will first be delivering ice cream from Ben & Jerry’s and premium Thai food from Camile Thai.
Delivery drones are delivering supplies to marines in combat, allowing emergency food and ammunition deliveries in a short amount of time. The autonomous drones can carry 60 pounds of cargo and fly up to six miles away. The delivery drones are a part of the Tactical Resupply Unmanned Aircraft System’s (TRUAS) $225,000 competition.
Delivery drone company Wingcopter, in partnership with Merck and Frankfurt University, has completed its first drone delivery trial showcasing the benefits of drones as a delivery method. The delivery test spanned over 25 km from a Merck lab in Gernsheim, Germany, to the Merck headquarters in Darmstadt, Germany.
An Australian couple stuck on a quarantined cruise ship with cases of coronavirus on board have managed to get wine delivered by drone. The couple’s wine club was more than happy to send wine to the cruise ship via drone, leaving the couple a little bit happier.
Update: We have received confirmation that the claim by the couple was false after they told an Australian radio station.
The coronavirus may turn out to boost deliveries by drone. The spreading virus and fears of contagion have made it more difficult and costly for companies such as Alibaba to deliver their products to customers. Making such deliveries by drone and thus reducing human contact might offer a solution.
On Monday, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) proposed new safety standards for specific drones for package deliveries in the Federal Register. The move is seen as a crucial step in allowing routine package deliveries by drones in the not too distant future.
UC San Diego Health will be commencing tests involving drones as a delivery method for medical samples between its facilities in hopes to reduce the time potentiates for blood results and treatments. The testing is a collaboration between UC San Deigo Health, UPS, and Matternet.
Rady Children’s Institute for Genomic Medicine (GCIGM) has partnered with Deloitte to take a closer look into drone delivery as a means of transport for genomic samples. The partnership is still in the testing and funding stage to ensure samples make it through the delivery.
Australian fashion brand LSKD has partnered with Wing Aviation to deliver its products using drones, leading the way for fashion brands around the world. The first orders began last Thursday, January 23, with customers ordering through the Wing app.
Swiss Post’s drone delivery program will resume on January 27 after being suspended last May due to crashes. The drones were used to transport medical supplies and samples between two hospitals in less time compared to standard delivery methods.
In a recent survey, Clutch discovered that 39% of shoppers surveyed weren’t fazed if their packages were delivered or not delivered by a drone. 36% of people said they were more likely to order online if the package was delivered by a drone.
Drones have been delivering everything from life-saving medicine to coffee for some time now, but a Seattle company hopes to add cannabis to the list by using drones to deliver it directly to dispensaries.
GRN Holdings announced the move publicly in December when it signed a letter of intent to purchase drones for cannabis delivery.
While drone delivery is just taking off, delivering everything from coffee to medicine, IBM is taking steps to prevent drones from stealing packages from you. The system uses an internet of things device in combination with the IBM blockchain, to keep the packages in the right hands.
A new IMechE poll has found that only 23% of adults living in the United Kingdom support deliveries by drones. This was highlighted in a report titled: Public Perception: Drones. The surprisingly low level of support comes from concerns that include package theft and accidents.
The French Postal Service has started to use drones to deliver parcels to remote Alpine villages. A subsidiary of La Poste, DPD states that delivering packages by drone is more reliable, quicker, and safer than driving a van up a narrow mountain road in the winter when these roads are often icy or blocked by snow.
This morning the Wall Street Journal has a detailed article about deliveries by drone. They take a closer look at Amazon, Wing Aviation and Uber Technologies. For some reason, UPS with their Matternet drones are not getting that same amount of attention in this article, even though they recently were awarded a Part 135 certification by the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA).
Today, the NPR published a great article about drone deliveries that will soon take off. It talks about the drone deliveries that are taking place at the WakeMed Hospital Campus in partnership with UPS Flight Forward, using Matternet drones in Raleigh, NC. UPS recently was awarded a Part 135 certification from the FAA and the testing takes place as part of the UAS Integration Pilot Program. More testing with drone deliveries is taking place in Christiansburg, VA where Walgreens partners with FedEx and Wing Aviation.
UPS has received FAA approval for drone deliveries in the US through a Part 135 certification. The logistics company is now allowed to fly drones carrying more than 55 lbs, fly drones at night, and fly them beyond-visual-line-of-sight (BVLOS).