DroneUp unveiled its new Ecosystem, which comprises new technology designed to make drone delivery both scalable and economically feasible.
"Throughout the last few years, while working with leading retailers and QSRs, we have learned that end customers and communities love the speed and convenience of drone delivery. Survey after survey indicates 80-plus NPS scores that we have never seen in the last-mile and instant delivery space," says Tom Walker, CEO of DroneUp. "We also learnt that retailers and QSR brands want us to have a clear glide path that brings the cost of drone delivery lower than currently being offered by human-based delivery while maintaining high safety and dependability levels. With our autonomous ecosystem we are able to meet those customer demands and provide a solution capable of doing millions of deliveries every day. We are combining drone technology with ground infrastructure and on demand delivery like it has never been done before."
Key takeaways:
- The DroneUp Ecosystem’s transformative technology consists of centralized operations stations. Delivery missions are enabled by fully autonomous technology at client drop off and customer pick up sites.
- DroneUp’s Ecosystem provides a model where conventional delivery is limited to large packages with logistics no longer bound by traditional limitations.
- Deliveries are based on centralized loading points called a Destination Box (DBX), which are temperature-controlled standalone units that have the capacity to hold up to 30 packages at a time.
- Depots provide drone storage, charging, and maintenance; the Destination Box (DBX), the size of a parking space is a temperature-controlled autonomous smart container for the loading and unloading of packages; Loading Terminals designed to be integrated at customer facilities; and Charging Pads offer fast charging in a lightweight, modular form factor.
- Other features include purpose-built autonomous aircraft coupled with the delivery mechanisms and interfaces to operate with the ground infrastructure.
- And the software integrates the sophisticated control suite, including flight control, navigation, airspace management, logistics management, and safety-enhancing tools.