Has Drone Delivery Finally Arrived? Let's take a look at the landscape!

Note: Everything stated in this article is of my own opinion and does not reflect the views or opinions of anyone or any other entity.

Almost 6 years after Jeff Bezos initially revealed plans for Amazon Prime Air in an interview on 60 minutes, we're starting to hear more companies announce their own plans to begin drone deliveries. In New York City alone, about 1.5 million packages are delivered on a daily basis, accounting for more than 500 million packages delivered annually. This means there is a massive market opportunity for those providers that can improve the packages, transport, and delivery of packages to customers worldwide. Can we finally get our Amazon packages by air? Are we finally in the era of the Jetsons? Let's take a look at the landscape.

Amazon has come a long way since the initial announcement from Bezos over 6 years ago. Back in 2016, Amazon Prime Air delivered their first item to a customer in Cambridgeshire, England. Since then, Amazon has continued to iterate on their initial prototypes to create a more efficient drone, and even patented a bee-hive style deployment system. Although Bezos vowed to be the first, Alphabet's Wing beat them to it, becoming the first commercial drone delivery service in the US.

Walmart submitted a patent application that allows for drone landings outside of large buildings. Once the drone has landed, a "trap door" would open allowing the package to move through the building's transportation system that can deliver the packages to residents units as needed. While Walmart is still in the early stages, this patent shows that the company is investing money and resources to improving the time from order to delivery.

UPS, on the other hand, was one of the first companies to receive a BVLOS certificate that's allowed them to start testing medical sample deliveries at WakeMed Hospital in Raleigh, NC. Through successful testing, they're building out the ground and air infrastructure to meet the needs of their diverse client base. “As the country’s first fully-certified drone airline, UPS Flight Forward is rapidly building a robust customer base and a network of technology partners to galvanize our leadership in drone delivery,” said Scott Price, UPS chief strategy and transformation officer. “We will create new logistics and delivery solutions no one has ever considered. Previous industry thinking had been limited to only ground transportation technology. Now we’re thinking in three dimensions.”

And of course, we can't talk about drone delivery without mentioning Uber. In June, Uber announced that they would begin delivering food via drone through a slightly different mechanism. The drones will first deliver food to safety zones, such as the roofs of their uber driver's cars. From there the driver would grab the package and deliver it by hand to the customer. Uber is currently trialing with customers in San Diego, where residents can expect to pay up to $8.50 for delivery via drone.

Just last week the FAA has approved the first segment of a 50-mile drone corridor between Syracuse and Rome, New York. The approval allows drones to fly beyond visual line of sight within an 8-by-4-mile section of airspace between Griffiss International Airport and the New York State Department of Homeland Security and Emergency Services’ State Preparedness Training Center in Oriskany. State officials said they expect the approval to open the door to FAA approval of additional sections of the 50-miles corridor in 2020. This announcement is crucial for the advancement of drone deliveries, as it allows the FAA to continue to evaluate for safety and efficiency, and better support future corridors.

We're certainly getting closer to a vision of a Jetson's future. At the start of 2019, I predicted BVLOS waivers would continue to drive drone industry adoption. Expect additional development in 2020 as companies start providing broader drone deliveries to residential customers, as well as initial developments of autonomous aerial passenger transport vehicles.

Thoughts or comments? Where do you think the drone delivery space is headed next? I'd love to hear in the comments below.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Jay Mulakala currently leads the Sales Engineering team at DroneDeploy, a fast-growing startup working to make drone data accessible to anyone, anywhere. Prior to joining DroneDeploy, Jay has worked in a variety of roles across product, user experience, engineering, and marketing. Jay was the Product Manager at Kespry, working to help build the next generation of cloud applications within Aggregates and Mining, Construction, and Insurance. Jay has also co-founded FreeSkies, a Bay-area drone startup that revolutionized consumer drones for use in professional photography and videography. Find out more at www.JMulakala.com.