Delivery drones

Over the past couple of years, the UK's Royal Mail service has been exploring the potential of drones to service remote corners of the nation, and is now pressing ahead with its plans for automated aerial delivery.

This unique heavy-lift UAV out of Edinburgh promises to obliterate the power and range of electric drones using a Rotax engine and bent-axis hydraulic motors similar to those used on huge tree harvesters. It's now lifting 95 kg in testing.

Innovative vertical propulsion company Cyclotech has partnered with Yamato, one of Japan's largest delivery companies, to produce a concept for a very unique-looking mid-capacity delivery drone using Cyclotech's thrust-vectoring propulsion system.

Back in 2017, Wing began dropping off burritos to hungry folks in rural Australia, and has since broadened its offerings to include coffee, fried chicken and Vietnamese cuisine. Its latest move in this space might be its biggest one yet.

By using digitally-distributed hydraulic propulsion and combustion engines, Flowcopter says its heavy-lift drones will stay aloft for up to six hours, covering up to 900 km of range on a tank. The first prototype is starting flight tests.

Described by his PR team as "like Russia's Elon Musk," serial entrepreneur Mikhail Korkorich says his new company Destinus is building a hydrogen-powered, zero-emissions, transcontinental cargo drone capable of hypersonic Mach 15 cruise speeds.

As it stands, air freight is incredibly quick but also very expensive, while ocean freight is far slower but very cost-effective. Startup Natilus is out to bridge the gap with a new breed of unmanned aircraft featuring a unique blended wing body.

Kawasaki has shoehorned the supercharged 1,000cc engine from its wild H2R hyperbike into a heavy-lift autonomous cargo helicopter, and has now demonstrated a robotic system for loading and unloading it without exposing humans to those big blades.

A pair of autonomous FlyingBasket FB3 heavy-lift drones have made their first urban cargo deliveries in Europe. Approved by the Italian authorities, each carried a 26 kg (57 lb) payload on a 3.9 km (2.4 mile) route in Torino before returning home.

While there are numerous questions about the logistics of drone delivery technology, here's one that not everyone thinks of: What if no one is home when the drone shows up? Well, the DroneDek system is designed with that scenario in mind.

It was just last year that we heard about A2Z Drone Delivery's RDS1 system, which lets third-party delivery drones drop cargo to customers on a long tether. Well, the technology has now been incorporated into a custom-designed multicopter drone.

Researchers have deployed drones carrying defibrillators to the sites of real-world cardiac arrests for the first time. On average, the unmanned aircraft arrived well ahead of ambulance crews, with the medical devices safely in tow.