Logistics

Back in January, Elroy Air showed off a pre-production version of an autonomous cargo drone capable of carrying 500-lb loads over 300 miles, and we've now learned FedEx plans to soon put these capabilities to the test.

San Francisco's Elroy Air has revealed its pre-production Chaparral C1, an autonomous VTOL lift & cruise cargo drone running on a hybrid-electric system that allows it to transport loads up to 500 lb over distances up to 300 miles.

Earlier in the year, TuSimple sent one of its autonomous trucks on a 900-mile journey from Arizona to Texas, though human drivers took the wheel for the first and last parts. Now a semi-truck has completed an 80-mile trip on public roads on its own.

General Motors new spin-off BrightDrop has completed its first delivery less than twelve months after it was launched. The company's EV600s have been handed off to FedEx, who will put them to work along its growing charging network in California.

Alphabet-owned Waymo is looking to gain a strong foothold in the nascent autonomous freight industry, today announcing plans to build a dedicated hub for its self-driving trucks in the state of Texas.

After agreeing to build 10,000 electric delivery vans for UPS last year, UK startup Arrival has today revealed specs and images for its latest all-electric van, ahead of trials on public roads "with key customers" this (northern) summer.

The German Aerospace Center has revealed a working prototype of a multi-use urban mobility and logistics vehicle called U-Shift, which is made up of an electric U-shaped base platform that's used to ferry around various pod modules.

To prevent packages being lost or damaged in transit – or at least make it easier to figure out what went wrong – European start-up LivingPackets has now unveiled the second generation of its reusable smart packaging called The Box.

EHang has achieved another important milestone in its effort to make its passenger-grade autonomous aerial vehicles a common sight in the skies. The CCAC has granted permission for the air taxis to be used for heavy-lift logistics.

If Amazon’s drone delivery service is to get off the ground, it’ll need some major infrastructure upgrades to support it. A new patent awarded to the retail giant could see drones being patched up and launched from mobile maintenance facilities carted around on the back of trains, trucks and ships.

​Nike's newly-expanded European Logistics Campus covers 150,000 sq m (1.6 million sq ft) and allows the sportswear behemoth to serve its online, retail and wholesale customers across 38 countries from a single location. It also makes the firm more efficient, more responsive and more sustainable.

From the bow to the bunker buster to the the hydrogen bomb, new technologies have changed the face of warfare, and 3D printing looks set to be just as revolutionary.