Amazon tries to minimize the delivery time of the package using a variety of methods. These are high-speed cars, and agreements with transport companies, and with 3D printers on board, which go out on local orders, creating the spare parts and parts that the customer needs.
Amazon makes a big bet on drones, believing that the delivery of goods by air is the fastest and most efficient way from point A to point B. In order to be able to work with drones as couriers, the corporation is lobbying a number of laws in the United States and other countries, which allows you to use air mini-transport for delivery. In addition, new models of such devices are being developed, as well as infrastructure elements. It has now become known that the company has filed a patent application for a tower for courier copters, from where drones will fly out with goods.
As for the very method of delivery using a drone, it is not necessarily a “courier to the door”. The place of delivery may change, for example, if the recipient of the parcel is moving. Drones will receive information about the delivery location by receiving data from the customer's smartphone. In total, delivery is provided: “Bring me”, “Home”, “To work” and “My boat”.
Drones will be built in a variety of sizes, the size will depend on the planned payload. Right now, Amazon's typical "flying courier" is an eight-propeller quadcopter with a computer control system that mounts in the middle and top of the frame. The maximum flight altitude for the drones developed by the company is 120 meters. The speed of the device in the air reaches 80 kilometers per hour.
The final design of the copters is not ready yet. The company explains this as follows: “We are testing several types of aircraft and delivery mechanisms in order to determine the best method in various environments.” Also, once the design of the drones is approved and goes into production, the design of the drones can change over time.
As for the tower for drones, it will be a multi-level building, with entrances for people, entrances and exits for cars (including trucks) and multiple "trays" for the departure and return of drones. According to company representatives, the towers will be installed in the largest population centers, where delivery by any other means is difficult. Such centers can be New York, London, Tokyo and other metropolitan areas.
True, there are several difficult moments of a legal nature. The fact is that drone flights are prohibited in large cities in most countries. The fact is that the authorities are afraid of their breakdowns during the flight. After all, even a small drone can be a significant danger if it falls on the heads of people walking below from a height of 200-300 meters and above. So, before building towers, the company will have to sort out all these points.
The company's patent application states the following: "A multi-level center is designed to support the takeoff and landing of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), likely within the city, including densely populated regions."
Several levels in such a center are needed in order for several copters to work at once. It will be like a miniature airfield - some aircraft take off, some return and land on their site. The company says that patents like this are not just like sketches from the future, such documents make this future a reality.
Number of patent applications filed by the company that are related to logistics using UAVs and other autonomous systems
Amazon is testing its systems at a secret test site in Cambridge, and testing is also underway at several sites elsewhere, including Israel and Canada.
The company also uses other methods to deliver goods quickly. For example, the semi-automatic Amazon Locker service. It can be used as a delivery point. One of these is located in Granada, where I live.
A Google search for "Amazon drone" yields 313 million results. Even if the world's largest online retailer never delivers a single package using Octocopters, Amazon.com founder and CEO Jeff Bezos () on the air of the program on Sunday 60 minutes on the CBS channel has already helped the company a lot. According to ChannelAdvisor analysts, sales of the Internet giant on Cyber Monday, December 2, soared by 44% compared to last year (this, for example, is 2.5 times higher than the result of IBM). “I don’t want anyone to think that we are talking about the near future,” Bezos assured viewers.
However, few people listened to these words.
Delivering internet packages using smart aircraft has captured the minds of Amazon's multimillion-dollar customer base and has become the number one topic in all the leading technology and business publications. The CEO's futuristic plan to recruit aerial robots that can land in your backyard 30 minutes after ordering via GPS navigation sounds too good to be true. However, he is not the truth. For several reasons.
Firstly, the bright prospects of the project run the risk of running into the realities of national legislation. As Bezos himself noted, in the United States, flights of mail drones with parcels on board are considered illegal. Amazon's CEO's statement that it will take two years to obtain government approval looks overly optimistic. The American aviation regulator FAA confirms that the possibility of liberalizing the conditions for flying drones is being discussed, but it is not necessary to wait for the full certification of innovative devices before 2020.
Today, with the permission of the FAA, only police and government drones can fly over the territory of the United States. Private devices are limited to projects of enthusiasts who are strictly forbidden to raise their robots above 120 m and lose sight of them. Congress has already passed a resolution to clear airspace for the commercial use of drones from 2015. But for now, these are just declarations of intent. Of course, Amazon will be actively testing the Prime Air delivery system in the coming years, but this does not mean that the checkout of the new service will become available on the retailer's website tomorrow or in the next quarter.
Secondly, the company has invested billions of dollars in recent years building logistics centers that are not geographically capable of 30-minute drone flights. The half-hour deadline announced by Bezos for packages weighing up to 2.5 kg remains realistic if you live within a radius of 16 km from the Amazon facility. Even this distance does not take into account force majeure, in which the drones will not have to plot a direct route, but bypass obstacles, slow down due to weather conditions and prohibited areas. But let's make a discount and agree: yes, the battery charge of "octocopters" is enough.
That's good news if you live in Carrollton, Texas, near Amazon's massive 100,000-square-foot sorting center. m in Coppell.
But the guys from the Dallas suburbs are hardly in need of uninterrupted deliveries of goods by drones.
The same in Florida, where the largest cities of the state - Tampa and St. Petersburg - are close to the coveted radius, but still inaccessible to Prime Air with the current functionality of flying mailmen. In California, drones will be able to reach the relatively large San Bernadino (pop. 213,000) and Tracy (population 85,000), but residents of Los Angeles, San Jose, San Francisco and San Diego will be left without parcels.
Of course, it cannot be ruled out that Amazon will build new logistics facilities, but why, if in the States the retailer already has an extensive network of 52 distribution centers with a total warehouse area of 3.7 million square meters. m? Moreover, it was created with the obligatory condition of saving by renting land away from cities. So a radical change in strategy from a business point of view makes little sense for the company.
Here are some more arguments.
Delivery within the city- the project is utopian in practice. Even if the drones learn to perfectly navigate in space and avoid collisions with each other and with foreign objects, navigation through areas of high-rise chaotic buildings with uneven terrain will deprive them of their main advantage - speed. They will either have to fly too low, posing a threat to people and vehicles, or climb too high, where the wind can easily make adjustments to the speed and direction of movement.
And when, having overcome all the difficulties, the innovative postman approaches your house - what will happen next?
In apartment buildings, he will have to leave the package with the concierge. Given that this is not always possible with live UPS couriers, there are fair doubts about the functionality of their electronic "colleagues". Amazon says it has already built these risks into the invention. The most realistic way out deprives the whole idea of a futuristic flair: drones will place packages in special containers at the nearest 7-Eleven store so that the addressee can pick them up at any time convenient for him. Another scenario that is more intriguing in theory is delivery to the balcony (although not all apartments have balconies).
The speed of drones is their absolute plus, but it dictates strict requirements for the weight of the package.
Traditional delivery in this sense does not limit customers in any way. Yes, the package is not delivered within half an hour, but is it important? Google, eBay, and others are constantly improving their one-day delivery services, and it's unlikely that online shoppers will be so impressed with Amazon's offering that they immediately opt for a beautiful, but under-experienced alternative.
Weather is another important aspect that cannot be ignored. Weather conditions will inevitably "land" Bezos' mail robots on a regular basis. The magic of Amazon lies in simplicity: you register, make a couple of clicks - and a maximum of a couple of days (if you are a resident of the States) you have the thing at home. Logistics, geography of sorting centers, any problems are not your concern.
The complex chain of Bezos' empire operates quietly and efficiently.
Let's imagine that the online giant built a facility near Boston and covered both the city and its satellites with the Prime Air service. Suddenly, the weather deteriorates sharply, you get sick and want to quickly order the medicine without having to leave the house. However, on the Amazon website, you will learn that the entire fleet of drones is forced to remain on the ground, as forecasters promise strong gusts of wind and snowfall. It's not that much of a fantasy. Amazon innovations have yet to prove their viability in "combat" conditions - only one package out of a thousand may not be delivered to the addressee, otherwise the drones will not meet the quality standards set by Bezos on the market. Yes, the robot can do amazing things, but a drone with eight propellers is too risky an object in the sky in bad weather. So bad weather is definitely one of the main threats to the bright future of mail drones.
The time has not come. Bezos' dreams are destined to come true, but not in the foreseeable future. As analyst Samil Shah rightly pointed out, Prime Air -
it is "either a joke, or a trick, or a PR stunt."
“Or are they just provoking skeptics?” he wrote on his Twitter. As a PR stunt, the drones really did an excellent job. Yes, and skeptics poured a lot of bile on Bezos. However, the Amazon CEO knows how to play the long game like no other. He's already investing in technology for the next decade, while most CEOs are thinking about how to get through the next quarter.
Amazon has been criticized a lot lately for violating labor laws. Well, in that case, Prime Air is good news for Bezos' underlings: flying robots won't be replacing them anytime soon.
Amazon Prime Air is a service that will deliver packages up to five pounds in 30 minutes or less using small drones.
How are you going to ensure safety?
Safety is our top priority. Our vehicles will be built with multiple redundancies, as well as sophisticated “sense and avoid” technology. Additionally, through our testing, we will gather data to continue improving the safety and reliability of our systems and operations.
When will I be able to choose Prime Air as a delivery option?
We will deploy when and where we have the regulatory support needed to safely realize our vision. We’re excited about this technology and one day using it to deliver packages to customers around the world in 30 minutes or less.
What will the Prime Air delivery vehicles look like?
We are testing many different vehicle designs and delivery mechanisms to discover how best to deliver packages in a variety of operating environments. The look and characteristics of the vehicles will continue to evolve over time.
Where are you building and testing?
We have Prime Air development centers in the United States, the United Kingdom, Austria, France and Israel. We are testing the vehicles in multiple international locations.
How will Amazon integrate Prime Air vehicles into the airspace?
Safety and security are top priorities as we look to incorporate small drones into the airspace. We "re working with regulators and industry to design an air traffic management system that will recognize who is flying what drone, where they are flying, and whether they are adhering to operating requirements.
What did you announce at re:MARS?
We revealed our latest Prime Air delivery drone design. Our newest design includes advances in efficiency, stability and, most importantly, in safety. We also shared more information about Amazon’s sense and avoid technology and our efforts to build an independently safe and autonomous drone that will make the safe decision, even when faced with the unexpected. To watch a flight test video and learn more about our new drone and our safety systems, visit the Day One Blog post, .
Amazon tries to minimize the delivery time of the package using a variety of methods. These are high-speed cars, and agreements with transport companies, and trucks with 3D printers on board, which go out on local orders, creating the spare parts and parts that the customer needs.
Amazon makes a big bet on drones, believing that the delivery of goods by air is the fastest and most efficient way from point A to point B. In order to be able to work with drones as couriers, the corporation is lobbying a number of laws in the United States and other countries, which allows you to use air mini-transport for delivery. In addition, new models of such devices are being developed, as well as infrastructure elements. It has now become known that the company has filed a patent application for a tower for courier copters, from where drones will fly out with goods.
As for the very method of delivery using a drone, it is not necessarily a “courier to the door”. The place of delivery may change, for example, if the recipient of the parcel is moving. Drones will receive information about the delivery location by receiving data from the customer's smartphone. In total, four types of delivery are provided: “Bring me”, “Home”, “To work” and “My boat”.
Drones will be built in a variety of sizes, the size will depend on the planned payload. Right now, Amazon's typical "flying courier" is an eight-propeller quadcopter with a computer control system that mounts in the middle and top of the frame. The maximum flight altitude for the drones developed by the company is 120 meters. The speed of the device in the air reaches 80 kilometers per hour.
The final design of the copters is not ready yet. The company explains this as follows: “We are testing several types of aircraft and delivery mechanisms in order to determine the best method in various environments.” Also, once the design of the drones is approved and goes into production, the design of the drones can change over time.
As for the tower for drones, it will be a multi-level building, with entrances for people, entrances and exits for cars (including trucks) and multiple "trays" for the departure and return of drones. According to company representatives, the towers will be installed in the largest population centers, where delivery by any other means is difficult. Such centers can be New York, London, Tokyo and other metropolitan areas.
True, there are several difficult moments of a legal nature. The fact is that drone flights are prohibited in large cities in most countries. The fact is that the authorities are afraid of their breakdowns during the flight. After all, even a small drone can be a significant danger if it falls on the heads of people walking below from a height of 200-300 meters and above. So, before building towers, the company will have to sort out all these points.
The company's patent application states the following: "A multi-level center is designed to support the takeoff and landing of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), likely within the city, including densely populated regions."
Several levels in such a center are needed in order for several copters to work at once. It will be like a miniature airfield - some aircraft take off, some return and land on their site. The company says that patents like this are not just like sketches from the future, such documents make this future a reality.
Number of patent applications filed by the company that are related to logistics using UAVs and other autonomous systems
Amazon is testing its systems at a secret test site in Cambridge, and testing is also underway at several sites elsewhere, including Israel and Canada.
The company also uses other methods to deliver goods quickly. For example, the semi-automatic Amazon Locker service. It can be used as a delivery point. One of these is located in Granada, where I live.
