“The commercial
use of Drones is an interesting technology and we’ll continue to evaluate it.
UPS invests more in technology than any other company in the Delivery business,
and we’re always planning for the future”
UPS Company spokesman on UPS plans to develop their own Drones
for Delivering Packages
Wow! That didn’t
take long. Soon after Amazon made their
announcement that they’re doing research into their own fleet of Drones for 30
minute 5 lb Package deliveries as stated in my blog article
entitled “Amazon
plans to launch Amazon PrimeAir, their 30 minute Drone Package Delivery Service
for Amazon Prime users - Playing Catch-up as Mailpak launches DealBug in
Jamaica”, UPS has come out of their corner swinging.
They too are
apparently doing research into their OWN Drone fleet for 30 minute Package Delivery
as reported by unnamed sources to The Verge in the article “UPS researching its own Delivery
Drones to compete with Amazon's Prime Air”, published December 3,
2013 08:29 am By Ben Popper, The Verge and “HEADS UP, AMAZON! UPS IS
ALSO TESTING DRONE DELIVERY”, published December 3, 2013 by Andrew
Couts, DigitalTrends.
FedEx founder
Fred Smith also has expressed an interest in developing a Drone fleet, with the
FAA (Federal Aviation Authority) being the main stumbling block, quote: “We have all this stuff working in the lab
right now, we don’t need to reinvent the wheel. We need a set of rules from the
FAA. It’s just a matter of getting the laws in place so companies can begin
building to those specifications and doing some real field testing”.
So that make three (3) bulls in the pen; one Internet Shopping company whose CEO pre-announced his intentions in a bid to boost Cyber Monday Internet traffic to his website and two (2) other that may have a more practical reason to do Drones, that being reducing the cost of Labour involved in Package Delivery.
FedEx and UPS in the Mix – Old Dogs teaching Drones New
Tricks
Despite Amazon’s showmanship in a bid to cut out the Package
Delivery folks, they’ve got some serious research to do as it relates to safely
piloting these things around autonomously. Just like the challenge of
Autonomous Vehicles that can safely drive in Traffic being developed by Volvo’s
SARTE Project as stated in my blog article
entitled “Volvo
Testing Autonomous Motor Vehicles in Spain in Live Traffic - EU Project SARTRE
adds self-driving AI with smartphone Control” the same type of tech will have to be incorporate into
these Drones for the purpose of Collision avoidance.
North American
CEO for the Drone manufacturer DJI Colin Guinn, pointed out as much, as Drone
Tech is basically in its infancy with most Drones being Remote piloted, not
Autonomous, quote: “A company like Amazon
or UPS could have a safe, operational fleet in 18-24 months. What we need in
terms of tech is improved object detection and avoidance, because GPS
coordinates alone won’t cut it if you got a car or some kids in the driveway”.
His concerns can
be seen just by studying the Amazon
PrimeAir Video.
Amazon may be doing this as a bit of
showmanship as the technology is far from perfected, hence the FAA's candor.
But for UPS and FedEx, it means reduce trans-shipments in-between its various Package
Distribution Centers, reducing the cost of ferrying small Packages as that
doesn't involved the complex logistics of interacting with people.
Cheaper Package Deliver Logistics - Business and Corporate
clients with Personal Delivery Drones
They'd just
designate a landing pad for the Packages and the Drones can be as large as the
FAA regulations can allow, even designed to carry thousands of pounds of Packages
or the equivalent of a UPS Truck by Air autonomously, shaving millions off the
cost of Ground Transportation of Packages in terms of Employee Wages and Fuel.
For the Package
Delivery guys though, it also means bending their will to suit large Internet
and Brick and Mortar Retailers like Amazon
and Wal-Mart, who may be interested in the idea of faster Deliveries of
Packages via Drones. News of their plans to also make drones as well indicates
that they are not only planning to use drones to reduce the cost of trans-shipments
in-between its various Package Distribution Centers.
They are also
looking to capitalize and large Business and Corporate clients in the Cities
that may also want to have Drone Deliveries within 30 minutes, a developing
phenomenon in the Package Delivery Industry I’d like to call Premium Rush
Effect!
To quote law
professor specializing in Drones and robotics Ryan Calo who sums it up best,
quote: “I think from both a tech and a policy perspective, delivering to
consumers in residential areas is going to be tough thing to accomplish any
time soon. But a company like UPS could use Drones to bring Packages quickly
and cheaply from a major airport or city to pick-up centers in more remote
locations, speeding up Delivery for a lot of customers”.
Lindsworth Deer’s Idea – Drones for Deliver need a Design
Refresh and Customer Control
Worse case
scenario is that the Drone is crippled after such an attack. In such a case many
options dependent on the severity of the damage as assessed by the Drones
onboard AI (Artificially Intelligence) program which has to make all the
decisions on its own wi9thoith human intervention. Otherwise these would be
remotely piloted Drones and would be no less costly than having Delivery men Premium Rush (2013) the Packages
to your doorstep.
Not only that,
but the armament on any Drones used for Delivery would have to be improved to
make them impervious to persons using shotguns to shoot them down. In the case
where shooters target the rotors, the Drones also need to be designed to either
increase power to the other rotors to give extra lift and take evasive
maneuvers to escape from the predators. This feature is a technology that’s
basically military in origin and is an opening for Military contractors to
partake in the soon-to-be-expanding Commercial Drone Design Industry.
If the Drone is
damaged to the point that it can’t fly on, the last decision the AI need to
make is to release the Package and safely parachute it to the ground. The Drone
needs to also deploy its own parachute to make sure it doesn’t fall from the
sky and hurt unsuspecting passers-by below.
If it’s still
airworthy the Drone’s AI can then make the decision to either fly back to the
Fulfillment Center if possible or land at a designated spot and transmit its
location back to Amazon’s NOC (Network
Operations Center).
My suggestion is
elegantly simple as pointed out in my blog article
entitled “Amazon
plans to launch Amazon PrimeAir, their 30 minute Drone Package Delivery Service
for Amazon Prime users - Playing Catch-up as Mailpak launches DealBug in
Jamaica”; just design the Drones to fly faster and higher as per the FAA’s
regulations. That means Amazon has to come
up with a whole new design for the Drones, preferably designed to fly like an
aeroplane in flight but revert back to Helicopter mode when coming in for a
landing.
This would make
Transit Faster and Have the Package inside of the Craft instead of being
exposed to the elements i.e. Rain and Wind, as can be seen in the Amazon PrimeAir video. Even better too would
be a guided landing; the Amazon Prime, UPS
or FedEx customer would have an app on their smartphone or Tablet that hands
over control of the craft allowing for the person to control the Drone and tell
it where to land the Package.
Even better though,
is a designated Land Pad at the customer’s premises, no different from the
Customer having a Post Office box or a Mailbox for their regular USPS (United
States Postal Service) Mail. Amazon Prime,
UPS or FedEx customer would be given a special RFID Sticker to place on the
spot where they want their Drone Deliveries to be left. The Drone will simply
home in on the sticker and guide itself to that spot and leave the Package
there when the customer isn’t around to guide the landing.
Drones as personal Servants – Do you want one lump or Two
with your Coffee Sir
Drones as
personal servants it seems isn’t too far-fetched a proposition as suggested in
the article “Is
there a Kindle Drone in Amazon's future?”, published December 2, 2013 12:08
PM PST by Dan Farber, CNET News.This
development in Packaging to me is just the tip of the iceberg as another Giant
also stirred in the Robotics Field: Google.
Google, also
famous for working on their own Autonomous Vehicles, is also planning to head
into Robotics with former Google Android CEO Andy Rubin spearheading this
effort as reported in “Google
robots may pose challenge to Amazon drones”, published 4 December 2013 Last updated at 11:37 GMT By
Leo Kelion Technology reporter, BBC News
Google’s Robotics
Division is actually the cobbleing together of seven recently acquired Robotics
companies as explained in “Amazon
has drones, but Google's got robots - seven new robotics acquisitions,” in
fact, published December 4, 2013 -- 12:24 GMT (04:24 PST), By Liam Tung, ZDNet,
all purchased as if buying part to build an Android:
1.
Japan-based
Schaft, a maker of humanoids,
2.
Industrial
Perception, a maker of robotic 3D vision
3.
Meka,
a MIT Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Lab spinoff
4.
Redword
Robotics a maker of humanoid robots and robot arms
5.
Bot
& Dolly a maker of Robotic camera system
6.
Autofuss
a Robotics System Design firm
7.
Holomni,
a design firm that makes wheels
Knowing Google,
it’ll not just be about Vacuum cleaners and House Robots only but possibly they
may be eyeing these developments and realizing that there is coming market
place for Personal Drones to assist humans in their everyday life.
By the end of
2014, Personal Drones pioneered by
either Google or Amazon may be the next
big thing as predicted in my blog article
entitled “Tech
Predictions for 2014 - PC killin' Tablets and Wearable Computers, Personal
Drones and Autonomous Vehicles Hydrogen Fuelled Cars” coming from the likes
of Google and even Apple!
This may
eventually have implications for the Revival of the Postal Service here in
Jamaica with Courier Services such as Mailpak in Jamaica leading the charge.
This is definitely something we can pioneer as the technology is fairly simple as
pointed out in my Geezam blog
article “Skycam
Jamaica Aerial Photography marks possible Revival of Package Delivery in the
Jamaica Postal Service”.
After all Americans
already inseparable from our smartphones and Tablets; what about a Personal Android
Drone that an extension of your Android Smartphone or Tablet? Google can pull
it off for sure, making Personal Drones that are Almost Human (2013)!
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