Shanghai Drone Deliveries Follow Shenzhen Trials

After nearly a year of trial operation in Shenzhen, Meituan UAV takeaway will soon be launched in Shanghai, and it is currently in the internal test phase.

On November 28, Dragon TV showed an example in a report. When a user logged into the Meituan app, he found that a coffee shop located one kilometer away could be delivered by drone. Ten minutes after he placed an order for two cups of coffee, he hangs up The drone carrying the meal box landed at an automated airport with a meal cabinet, and the two cups of coffee were intact.

The radius of the drone delivery service is planned to be 2 kilometers, and the time from order to receipt is controlled at 17 minutes. In the future, it will mainly deliver catering products with high timeliness requirements, such as cakes and ice cream. It will also involve night drug delivery, and the load capacity is not More than 2.5 kg. If weather conditions permit, the drone can fly at an altitude of sixty to seventy meters and a speed of up to 10m/s.

It is worth noting that drone delivery needs to apply to the air traffic control department in advance, and the flight time and the coordinates of the flight must be reported in detail.

The entry of UAV delivery into Shanghai is the result of the cooperation between Meituan and Shanghai Jinshan District. The cooperation will start from Jinshan Industrial Zone and expand to the core urban area of ​​Jinshan, gradually establishing a “3km 15-minute reach” low-altitude smart logistics covering East China. The internet.

At the beginning of this year, Meituan UAV completed the first order delivery task for real users in Shenzhen. At present, Meituan UAV has opened 8 UAV delivery routes in 4 business districts in Shenzhen; July 8 this year , At the 2021 World Artificial Intelligence Conference, Meituan officially released its drone delivery plan.

So, how is drone delivery delivered? It mainly includes three parts: UAV, cloud dispatch system, and automated airport.

For users, there is not much difference between ordering takeaways in peacetime. In August of this year, a reporter from Shenzhen Commercial Daily discovered during the experience that there was no difference in delivery fees between drone delivery and rider delivery.

The rider needs to play the role of the cargo loader, go to the merchant to pick up the cargo, and deliver it to the drone equipment at the take-off point.

After the goods are packed, under the control of the cloud scheduling system, the drone will deliver the goods to the automated airport in the community according to the planned route. The goods will be delivered to the self-pickup cabinet under the airport. The user can use the mobile phone QR code After picking up the goods, the drone returns along the original route.

Jiemian News reported

 that there will be relay distribution stations and building distribution stations in the future. The former adds robotic arms and robots to deliver goods from the roof to different floors; the latter refers to the transformation of buildings to provide elevator-like passages for drones.

In an interview, Chu Zheng, director of UAVs at Meituan Dianping , said that UAVs are responsible for more time-efficient delivery. The rider is responsible for delivering 100 meters before and after and interacting with the machine, such as the delivery robot inside the building. Work together to form a complete system to fulfill the needs of the entire city’s end-of-city distribution logistics.”

Drone delivery has already landed in Shenzhen and Shanghai, will it be expanded to more cities in the future? At least, it will take time to establish a truly complete urban low-altitude logistics network.

There are two benefits that consumers can directly feel. One is that the drone can take out goods quickly, and they can rest assured that they need to be delivered immediately; the other is that they can enjoy the takeaway service at night or under the epidemic situation.

However, there are also many concerns about UAV delivery, such as high thresholds for operation and maintenance management capabilities such as background scheduling, complex urban layout, and inability to operate in rainy and snowy weather.

As of June this year, Meituan drones have completed flight tests of more than 200,000 sorties, and delivered more than 2500 real orders, which can achieve stable landing under the condition of level 5 wind.

Mao Yiyi, head of the UAV business of Meituan, proposed four requirements for UAVs to be safe, efficient, economical, and autonomous and controllable. Taking safety as an example, Qubit reported that Meituan drones have 6 power systems on their fuselage, which can safely land even if one power system fails; Meituan’s self-developed UTM system guarantees two or more drones. There will be no overlap.

In April this year, when Meituan’s unmanned delivery vehicle landed in Shunyi, Meituan’s chief scientist Xia Huaxia emphasized that the purpose of Meituan’s research and development of unmanned delivery was not to achieve lower delivery costs than humans, but to maintain costs without increasing. Ship more orders.

Source: ifanr