Drone distribution injects new momentum into the development of smart logistics

A few years ago, when drone logistics, artificial intelligence, and virtual reality were all included in Zuckerberg's ambition roster, there were only a handful of remarkable products or services in the domestic drone logistics industry. Nowadays, we not only have drone aviation operations, but also unimaginable urban logistics routes.
With the continuous development of big data analysis, cloud computing technology, and artificial intelligence, smart logistics that integrates new technologies starts from the countryside and slowly moves toward the city, which not only promotes the rapid development of the entire logistics industry, but also improves new logistics formats New kinetic energy.

1. In the
18 years of rebuilding a new logistics system , our country’s express delivery business volume reached 50.71 billion pieces, and the per capita express delivery usage was 36 pieces, an increase of 7 pieces over 2017. On the other hand, our country’s express delivery business volume surpasses the developed economies of the United States, Japan, and Europe combined, and the scale has been ranked first in the world for five years, more than three times that of the second largest United States, and accounted for more than half of the global express delivery business volume.
However, even though our country's logistics market is extremely large today, express logistics is mainly dominated by manual labor, driven by the physical strength of tens of thousands of delivery personnel carrying them on their shoulders. In addition, in logistics distribution, the "last mile" distribution efficiency has become a cost bottleneck in the logistics industry. Data information shows that our country's tail-end distribution costs have accounted for more than 30% of the total cost of the logistics industry, and some even accounted for 50%.
As the "black technology" of logistics and distribution, drones are undoubtedly an important weapon to solve the problem of "last mile" distribution efficiency. Compared with human distribution, UAVs have the characteristics of intelligence, information, and unmanned, and they have stronger distribution efficiency, which are deeply concerned by companies such as express delivery and e-commerce. The pursuit of capital and the gambling of giants have turned drones into the “sweet and delicious” of the logistics industry.
As a new format of the logistics industry, the development of drones has also become the focus of government departments. The Ministry of Industry and Information Technology issued the "Guidelines for the Construction of Unmanned Aircraft System Specification System (17-18 Edition)" in collaboration with relevant national departments in 2017, which clearly stated that the development goal of our country's drones is to be civil drones by this year. The industrial output value reached 60 billion yuan. At the same time, the Civil Aviation Administration has formulated relevant policies and regulations for drone operation, and clearly stipulated the conditions of pilots' employment and the operation specifications of drones.
With the development of unmanned aerial vehicles engaged in operational activities, more and more companies have begun to apply for the application of drones to carry out logistics and distribution business. In March 2018, SF Express obtained the first UAV aviation operation (pilot) license in China and began to develop UAV logistics and distribution business in the pilot area of ​​Ganzhou, Jiangxi. In February of the same year, the Northwest Regional Administration of Civil Aviation allowed JD.com to take on the pilot task of multimodal transport innovation in Shaanxi drone aviation logistics. In the previous August of 2017, JD.com had obtained approval for drone airspace covering the whole province in Shaanxi.
2. Urban drone logistics drives a new trend.
Whether it is an intruder in the “e-commerce” drone logistics industry such as SF Express and JD.com, or a rising star such as Xunyi, they all choose to develop drone logistics in rural areas. Pilot. According to Zhao Liang, the founder of Xunyi, the reason for choosing remote mountainous areas and villages is mainly due to the high logistics requirements in the city, while the rural airspace planning is relatively simple, the communication and electromagnetic environment is better, and the safety cost is better. Relatively low, it can give full play to the advantages of UAV transportation.
The development of UAV logistics in rural areas has accumulated a lot of experience for intelligent transportation. It's just that, taking the drone logistics transportation in remote mountainous areas and islands as a starting point, it may be the common goal of all companies to embark on a road of drone logistics and distribution to cities.
Ehang Intelligent is "the first person to eat crabs" for the logistics and delivery of drones in cities. If you live near the Super Species Man Plaza store in Guangzhou and submit an order through the Yonghui Life Mini Program Mall, you can enjoy the service of drone logistics and delivery to ensure that it will arrive within 15 minutes. The delivery mode is: the customer submits the order through the mobile phone client, the staff picks the goods and puts the goods into the drone on the landing platform, clicks the "take off" button, and the drone will deliver the goods to the target according to the preset channel Community. Before the plane is about to land, the distribution partner of the destination district will receive a prompt message, arrive at the take-off and landing point in advance, and complete the "last 100 meters" delivery.
The length of this channel is 1.7 kilometers, and the flying time of the drone is 3 to 4 minutes. UAVs are powered by pure electricity, and the cost of each flight distribution is basically zero. "So far, Ehang Intelligent has completed more than 4,000 drone deliveries, accounting for 30% to 40% of the online orders for Super Species." said Zhang Yan, vice president of Ehang Intelligent.
EHang Intelligent is not the only company that has launched the timely delivery of drones. On May 29 last year, Ele.me, the online food delivery platform, announced that it was approved to open up a batch of drones for timely delivery, and the food delivery drones were officially put into commercial operation. XunYi also "flyed" from the countryside to the city, launching a WeChat mini program XunYiSongBa that delivers food by drone. Customers in the Hangzhou Future Science and Technology City area can use this platform to order food. At this stage, Xunyi has cooperated with chain catering companies such as Starbucks, Jixiang Wonton, KFC, Gongcha, Lao Niang Jiu, Subway, etc. The delivery fee is 5 yuan per order.
However, this type of urban drone delivery mainly uses a transit delivery model, that is, the drone transports the goods from one site to another, and does not directly face the user. For drone logistics, the direct delivery model is the most difficult, that is, the drone is delivered directly to the user.
Now, the direct delivery method of urban drones has also taken a good start. Recently, EHang Intelligent and DHL have started cross-border cooperation. Using Songshan Lake in Dongguan, Guangdong Province as a pilot, it opened the first domestic drone logistics express route in the city from the user’s corporate office park to DHL Dongguan Liaobu SVC, and provided drones. Logistics distribution services. "Using drone logistics and distribution, the single delivery time of this route will be greatly shortened from 40 minutes to 8 minutes. At the same time, it can also reduce nearly 80% of the operating cost, which can better meet the flexible and high-frequency medium and high frequency in the city. Short-distance tail-end delivery customer needs. Aiming at the application scenario of "drone + express logistics", we and DHL jointly developed the DHL drone smart cabinet, which can further complete the overall process unmanned and intelligent." Zhang Yan said .
3. Across the "City of the Sky"
From express supermarket goods such as cherries to the delivery of life-saving anti-virus serum, from transit delivery to direct delivery, urban drone delivery has developed rapidly in just a few years.
From a technical point of view, the problem of power continuity in UAV logistics can be handled to a certain extent. At this stage, the UAV's endurance and control mileage can also reach 20 kilometers, and the delivery time is 20-25 minutes, which can basically meet the needs of short-distance intra-city delivery. People are more worried about the hardware problem of the infrastructure construction of drone takeoff and landing points. “The logistics distribution in the city involves the take-off and landing point, that is, the tail-end distribution that everyone said, still needs someone to transport it. The infrastructure construction of the drone take-off and landing point involves the interests of enterprises, users, etc., and more unmanned The construction of infrastructure at the take-off and landing point means a more complete logistics network, which is essential to promote the development of drone logistics.” Zhang Yan said.
Zhao Liang has similar views. In his opinion, even if UAV logistics can greatly reduce the cost of enterprises and is hailed as an important weapon to deal with the "last mile" distribution problem, the biggest challenge for its development is still how to control the cost with manpower distribution. Flat level.
In addition, for the development of drone logistics in cities, airspace approvals are still an insurmountable gap in front of commercial development. Although the value of urban drone logistics is much higher than that of rural areas, and the overall market space is larger than that of rural areas, it is also an order of magnitude more difficult to deal with problems such as airspace, waterways and the safety of drones. Many people in the industry believe that the need to build urban air traffic (UAM) is increasingly urgent. UAM can also ensure that civilian drones maintain low-altitude flight, provide operators with the information they need to ensure that they are far away from passenger aircraft and specific waterways, and fully consider restricted airspace and severe weather conditions.
With the continuous improvement of the safety and intelligence level of drones, and the construction of a more intelligent and efficient urban aerial three-dimensional traffic system, drones will have stronger autonomous decision-making capabilities, perception and avoidance capabilities, and anti-interference capabilities It will no longer be a fantasy to operate drone logistics in large cities with tall buildings and dense crowds.