I laugh when I hear people say "Amazon Air will never work"

[MadMitch88]

Re: I laugh when I hear people say "Amazon Air will never wo

If I received this I would want to know why is was so cold and would want to send it back. I think they would have some interesting insulation challenges delivering this way. It does not take long for a pizza to go cold. If it is decent insulation they are not going to want to leave that behind with the pizza either.

Uhhh, ever heard of a microwave? You put cold food in it and it gets hot rather quickly.

C'mon man, are you Ted Kaczynski or something? :lol:

 

[MadMitch88]

Re: I laugh when I hear people say "Amazon Air will never wo

I admit - I have been one who said people will shoot them down just for the fun of it.. with my tongue firmly pressed into my cheek... but I think it's silly to assume that because it's a felony, people won't try to knock these down and steal from them in some way shape or form... I mean... dudes just brought down the playstation network and xbox live partially just for the thrill and challenge of it and that caused REAL monetary damages that those guys don't directly benefit from.

Yeah but thugs also shoot at FedEx drivers and rob UPS trucks. So why is this sad fact going to stop drone delivery from becoming reality? UPS and FedEx insures their drivers and trucks and let's law enforcement do their thing to teach the thugs a lesson. Won't be any different for drones.

Drone delivery won't be perfect and won't be in mass use by 2016, but it will happen within 10 years in some capacity in several countries around the world. I may be a little too conservative with that estimate, considering how much technology has progressed in consumer drones in just the last 5 years.

 

[Hughie]

Re: I laugh when I hear people say "Amazon Air will never wo

If I received this I would want to know why is was so cold and would want to send it back. I think they would have some interesting insulation challenges delivering this way. It does not take long for a pizza to go cold. If it is decent insulation they are not going to want to leave that behind with the pizza either.

Uhhh, ever heard of a microwave? You put cold food in it and it gets hot rather quickly.

C'mon man, are you Ted Kaczynski or something? :lol:

Well I wont be ordering pizzas from you then

 

[MadMitch88]

Re: I laugh when I hear people say "Amazon Air will never wo

Well I wont be ordering pizzas from you then

That's cool with me, bro. I won't be accepting orders from anti-technology guys hiding out in little cabins in the woods.

:lol:

 

[Khudson7]

Re: I laugh when I hear people say "Amazon Air will never wo

The bottom line here as it pertains to Amazon Drone delivery is this:
My guess is Bezos is an aggressive businessman looking to spend money in order to make MORE money to his bottom line.
He is just looking at Drone delivery as a concept to lower his expenses on shipping thus increasing his bottom line profit.

From Forbes - "Last year Amazon spent about $6.64 billion on shipping, but brought in only about $3.1 billion in payments for shipping." In order to compete they have to offer free shipping as well...but that adversely affects the bottom line. So if he can overcome at least some of the hurdles, re-direct some of the cost of shipping to in-house(thru drone delivery) I am sure this is at the root of his thinking. He is not some altruistic person looking to better man-kinds existence. There is a method behind his madness.

As for how the hurdles getting overcome, my guess is he does not think much about that...rather surrounds himself with all the top technical staff necessary, pays them well and pushes them hard, to find the solutions. He is known to be a bull dog in that respect. I suspect they will find a way, eventually. But I believe his eye, is finding a way toward eliminating some of his outgoing costs to 3rd party companies that also have to make a profit in their fees. If he can just succeed in bringing say 25% of delivery in-house where he has more control on that expense,there is no question in my mind, a chunk of that $6.64 billion he spends in shipping costs, will land right on his bottom line profit. He has proven in a number of areas, to be a visionary in his way of doing business and make a profit at it.

Another example of his thinking was to sell a kindle fire at his costs, but tying it to his content thru Amazon, so the profit comes from buying the content, not the selling of the tablet itself.

Time will tell if he is successful at this or not...

 

[Buckaye]

Re: I laugh when I hear people say "Amazon Air will never wo

I admit - I have been one who said people will shoot them down just for the fun of it.. with my tongue firmly pressed into my cheek... but I think it's silly to assume that because it's a felony, people won't try to knock these down and steal from them in some way shape or form... I mean... dudes just brought down the playstation network and xbox live partially just for the thrill and challenge of it and that caused REAL monetary damages that those guys don't directly benefit from.

Yeah but thugs also shoot at FedEx drivers and rob UPS trucks. So why is this sad fact going to stop drone delivery from becoming reality? UPS and FedEx insures their drivers and trucks and let's law enforcement do their thing to teach the thugs a lesson. Won't be any different for drones.

Drone delivery won't be perfect and won't be in mass use by 2016, but it will happen within 10 years in some capacity in several countries around the world. I may be a little too conservative with that estimate, considering how much technology has progressed in consumer drones in just the last 5 years.

I don't actually think we're saying things very different from one another. I was just saying that part of what a business has to consider is whether drones will be a target for thugs and/or thieves. And again... I did not say this will STOP progress - it's just a consideration.

I actually agree with your last statement - as I think many do - it will take time.

As far as the pizza thing... you are CRAZY... everyone knows microwaves are the enemy of crispy pizza I want my pizza delivered hot - regardless if I have a microwave. You might be willing to settle for the coolness factor of getting a drone delivery... but as cool as drone delivery would be... a cold pizza would RUIN it for me :lol:

 

[Hughie]

Re: I laugh when I hear people say "Amazon Air will never wo

Well I wont be ordering pizzas from you then

That's cool with me, bro. I won't be accepting orders from anti-technology guys hiding out in little cabins in the woods.

:lol:

Oh ****. That is my supper ruined

 

[MadMitch88]

Re: I laugh when I hear people say "Amazon Air will never wo

From Forbes - "Last year Amazon spent about $6.64 billion on shipping, but brought in only about $3.1 billion in payments for shipping." In order to compete they have to offer free shipping as well...but that adversely affects the bottom line. So if he can overcome at least some of the hurdles, re-direct some of the cost of shipping to in-house(thru drone delivery) I am sure this is at the root of his thinking. He is not some altruistic person looking to better man-kinds existence. There is a method behind his madness.

I'm not really in the mood to sit down and crunch all the hard numbers, but Bezos knows at the most basic level that paying billions of dollars a year to FedEx and UPS for their massive infrastructure and human salaries and profit margins is not the most cost effective delivery system, especially for small items weighing less than 5 pounds. It almost makes me queasy to think about how much fossil fuel is spent flying a DVD across the country so that somebody's kids can watch "Frozen" two days after they order it !! I'm sure he has enough smart engineers to figure out how to make electric and gas-powered drones replace silly humans in their climate-destroying trucks.

Plus, Bezos has always thrived on being an innovator. Right now, I can't think of anything more innovating in the world of retail delivery than drones. Maybe 50 years from now, everything will be made on 3D printers and you simply pay for the CAD file to be downloaded to your machine. Of course, certain items like lobster tail and truffles will never be made on a 3D printer so a drone will have to deliver it to you in 30 min. in time for dinner or your money back!

 

[Buckaye]

Re: I laugh when I hear people say "Amazon Air will never wo

From Forbes - "Last year Amazon spent about $6.64 billion on shipping, but brought in only about $3.1 billion in payments for shipping." In order to compete they have to offer free shipping as well...but that adversely affects the bottom line. So if he can overcome at least some of the hurdles, re-direct some of the cost of shipping to in-house(thru drone delivery) I am sure this is at the root of his thinking. He is not some altruistic person looking to better man-kinds existence. There is a method behind his madness.

I'm not really in the mood to sit down and crunch all the hard numbers, but I think Bezos knows at the most basic level that paying billions of dollars a year to FedEx and UPS for their massive infrastructure and human salaries and profit margins is not the most cost effective delivery system, especially for small items weighing less than 5 pounds. It almost makes me queasy to think about how much fossil fuel is spent flying a DVD across the country so that somebody's kids can watch "Frozen" two days after they order it !! I'm sure he has enough smart engineers to figure out how to make electric and gas-powered drones replace silly humans in their climate-destroying trucks.

Plus, Bezos has always thrived on being an innovator. Right now, I can't think of anything more innovating in the world of retail delivery than drones. Maybe 50 years from now, everything will be made on 3D printers and you simply pay for the CAD file to be downloaded to your machine. Of course, certain items like lobster tail and truffles will never be made on a 3D printer so a drone will have to deliver it to you in 30 min. in time for dinner or your money back!

well - to be fair Madmitch - the amount of fossil fuel attributed to just the DVD video is really really small considering all the other items being moved at the same time. In fact it's that economy of scale regarding the use of energy that makes fedex etc al successful. Still - I would venture to guess that even if the fossil fuel for the Frozen DVD were the real issue... drones would only save the VERY last drop of that fuel to make their delivery... it's not like the drone will fly the dvd from the factory... and... while we're on the subject... who buys DVD's anymore... who are you Ted Kaczynsky? ( ) The other thing is - charging drones if they are battery power may very well use fossil fuel at some level... and nitro also is a fuel... anyway - I'm for cutting back on fossil fuel - but I don't think Drones (at least for this purpose) are going to make much of a dent in that.

 

[Fyod]

Re: I laugh when I hear people say "Amazon Air will never wo

I don't know how many people took the time to read the (pretty long) quoted article, but there's many explanations why it isn't financially viable.
The Pizza delivery is obviously a PR stunt. The idea itself is laughable and there's a very slim chance drones could ever compete with motorcycles that can carry 10 pizzas at a time and are even electric now.

If any of this is meant to rally happen, I can only think of two positives:
- There may be lots of investment going into battery technology.
- Commercial regulation may become cheaper and more simple to acquire a permit. Although we know how gov'ts work and the exact opposite could happen too.

On the other hand I do think drones will be very useful for catastrophe rescue (esp. with thermal cams), firefighters, cops will love them, etc. etc.
Delivery is just not the niche I view as important/viable for drones, except hard to reach areas and delivering important/expensive goods.

 

[ianwood]

Re: I laugh when I hear people say "Amazon Air will never wo

I doubt Amazon is simply looking to lower their delivery costs or make deliveries faster. Look at what they did with AWS. Not only did they find a way to scale their e-commerce systems, they created an entirely new business by architecting very sophisticated new technologies from scratch. They are now the biggest cloud provider in the world.

 

[Khudson7]

Re: I laugh when I hear people say "Amazon Air will never wo

I doubt Amazon is simply looking to lower their delivery costs or make deliveries faster. Look at what they did with AWS. Not only did they find a way to scale their e-commerce systems, they created an entirely new business by architecting very sophisticated new technologies from scratch. They are now the biggest cloud provider in the world.

Good point...Amazon does seem to continue to innovate in a number of fields...heck I am still trying find a copy of "Transparent" (which is still not available up here in Canada, by the way) a streaming service comedy that won them an award at the Golden Globes. They are in competition with companies like Netflix now, as well.

 

[MadMitch88]

Re: I laugh when I hear people say "Amazon Air will never wo

well - to be fair Madmitch - the amount of fossil fuel attributed to just the DVD video is really really small considering all the other items being moved at the same time. In fact it's that economy of scale regarding the use of energy that makes fedex etc al successful. Still - I would venture to guess that even if the fossil fuel for the Frozen DVD were the real issue... drones would only save the VERY last drop of that fuel to make their delivery... it's not like the drone will fly the dvd from the factory... and... while we're on the subject... who buys DVD's anymore... who are you Ted Kaczynsky? ( ) The other thing is - charging drones if they are battery power may very well use fossil fuel at some level... and nitro also is a fuel... anyway - I'm for cutting back on fossil fuel - but I don't think Drones (at least for this purpose) are going to make much of a dent in that.

Well drones will only make a big impact on the "last mile" of product delivery. Yes, shipping 50,000 DVDs across the country in a semi truck will still be the most cost effective for long haul transport, but just add up all the 100's of millions of gallons in fuel that UPS and FedEx consume every year by delivering products from their warehouses to customer addresses. Doesnt take a genius to figure out that charging up a small electric drone for pennies to make 1 or 2 deliveries on it's roundtrip mission will save a buttload of money in the long term.

FedEx and UPS will still be around for a long time. People will be ordering 80" inch TVs and microwaves so the gas-guzzling trucks will be needed.

 

[Buckaye]

Re: I laugh when I hear people say "Amazon Air will never wo

well - to be fair Madmitch - the amount of fossil fuel attributed to just the DVD video is really really small considering all the other items being moved at the same time. In fact it's that economy of scale regarding the use of energy that makes fedex etc al successful. Still - I would venture to guess that even if the fossil fuel for the Frozen DVD were the real issue... drones would only save the VERY last drop of that fuel to make their delivery... it's not like the drone will fly the dvd from the factory... and... while we're on the subject... who buys DVD's anymore... who are you Ted Kaczynsky? ( ) The other thing is - charging drones if they are battery power may very well use fossil fuel at some level... and nitro also is a fuel... anyway - I'm for cutting back on fossil fuel - but I don't think Drones (at least for this purpose) are going to make much of a dent in that.

Well drones will only make a big impact on the "last mile" of product delivery. Yes, shipping 50,000 DVDs across the country in a semi truck will still be the most cost effective for long haul transport, but just add up all the 100's of millions of gallons in fuel that UPS and FedEx consume every year by delivering products from their warehouses to customer addresses. Doesnt take a genius to figure out that charging up a small electric drone for pennies to make 1 or 2 deliveries on it's roundtrip mission will save a buttload of money in the long term.

FedEx and UPS will still be around for a long time. People will be ordering 80" inch TVs and microwaves so the gas-guzzling trucks will be needed.

Yeah - I'd have to see that math to fully buy into that thinking. UPS and Fedex both work very hard to plan their "last mile" routes to take advantage of economy of scale even in the direct delivery scenario. With a truck loaded up with deliveries and following the most direct route to people's homes and businesses - the cost of fuel per delivery is still pretty low for the volume they deliver. Yes... in rural areas this efficiency decreases - but in cities it increases.

Whereas drone delivery is individual flights to and from a single destination (so, in theory, drones would have to travel much further to make a delivery to you and then to your neighbor down the street).

Interestingly though... in an "on demand" business - like Pizza delivery... or I want cigarettes... your price per delivery argument makes more intuitive sense to me (though as a pizza delivery guy... I used to take several pies to several locations in a trip). But then we're back to the argument of how much can you carry - kind of thing.

It's all really interesting to me... and I think there's an application that makes sense... but there are a lot of variables for sure.

 

[Fyod]

Re: I laugh when I hear people say "Amazon Air will never wo

A drone flight is not pennies.
We know that Phantom batteries don't last very long, but even if they lasted 100 cycles, the price per flight just for the battery is $1.29. Not taking motors, maintenance, etc. into account.
They would need very good condition batteries to fly the longest distance. An 80% capacity battery is useless since 20% is a couple miles on a flight. Current LiPo technology does not provide any long life batteries, their cycle count is in the few hundreds, 80% usually way under 100 cycles.
I do not know what cycling the battery multiple times per day would do to it, never tried.

 

[ianwood]

Re: I laugh when I hear people say "Amazon Air will never wo

A drone flight is not pennies.
We know that Phantom batteries don't last very long, but even if they lasted 100 cycles, the price per flight just for the battery is $1.29. Not taking motors, maintenance, etc. into account.
They would need very good condition batteries to fly the longest distance. An 80% capacity battery is useless since 20% is a couple miles on a flight. Current LiPo technology does not provide any long life batteries, their cycle count is in the few hundreds, 80% usually way under 100 cycles.
I do not know what cycling the battery multiple times per day would do to it, never tried.

That would be the same reason why Amazon didn't build AWS using Windows Server. They invented their own low-level technology that was the fastest, most efficient to date. And that made all the difference. I doubt they'd just use off the shelf LiPos. What if they used hydrogen?

 

[fastsmiles]

Re: I laugh when I hear people say "Amazon Air will never wo

As I understand Amazon's plan, the drones would not fly from a warehouse to a delivery destination, but would only fly from a delivery truck to the destination.
The truck would reach a neighborhood and then launch the drones to deliver all the small packages to the homes in that area. The drones would be recovered as the truck proceeded to the next area.
This idea seems more viable, but still a great challenge.

 

[MacCool]

Re: I laugh when I hear people say "Amazon Air will never wo

As I understand Amazon's plan, the drones would not fly from a warehouse to a delivery destination, but would only fly from a delivery truck to the destination.
The truck would reach a neighborhood and then launch the drones to deliver all the small packages to the homes in that area. The drones would be recovered as the truck proceeded to the next area.
This idea seems more viable, but still a great challenge.

And perhaps their service area in larger cities with relatively dense and numerous neighborhoods is large enough to make that economically feasible, but I doubt it. They drive to a neighborhood, park it, load the drone, send it off and sit there twiddling while it delivers and comes back, then repeat. Hard for me to imagine that that will be more time-efficient than the driver just driving from house to house. I suppose they could carry multiple drones, but how many to reach a point of maximum cost-efficiency?

And that's just in population-dense neighborhoods. Farther-flung neighborhoods, and rural areas where there are fewer people per square mile...I don't see it as economically feasible. Still gotta have a driver, and I suspect the drone loading, deployment, and recovery will eat up far more time than just driving to each house.

Someday, maybe, as the technology matures. Not today. Drone delivery will be a novelty for years to come.

 

[GoodnNuff]

Re: I laugh when I hear people say "Amazon Air will never wo

I found this interesting, Skydio just received $3 million to develop obstacle avoidance for drones. I'm certain that Amazon is working on their own.
http://www.dronethusiast.com/skydio-lan ... 26%2C+2014

Amazon has made it quite clear that drone delivery will be a prime service, in limited markets, and deliveries will be within 5 miles of fulfillment centers. I have never heard about a plan to use trucks to carry the drone to point A so they can deliver to point B. Doesn't seem to fit the plan I've read about or heard mentioned?

 

[MadMitch88]

Re: I laugh when I hear people say "Amazon Air will never wo

A drone flight is not pennies.
We know that Phantom batteries don't last very long, but even if they lasted 100 cycles, the price per flight just for the battery is $1.29. Not taking motors, maintenance, etc. into account.
They would need very good condition batteries to fly the longest distance. An 80% capacity battery is useless since 20% is a couple miles on a flight. Current LiPo technology does not provide any long life batteries, their cycle count is in the few hundreds, 80% usually way under 100 cycles.
I do not know what cycling the battery multiple times per day would do to it, never tried.

You're not thinking about this in a large scale industrial application.

Large businesses pay wholesale rates on electricity, unlike much higher retail prices that the average consumer uses. So Amazon charging up thousands of drones every day for delivery missions will only cost around 25 cents max. per flight. Do the math and you will see I am right. Amazon might even copy the Oracle model and build their own power generation stations, perhaps solar or wind in appropriate locations.

Stop thinking a $150 billion company like Amazon will be using dinkly little Phantoms to deliver products. They will be using the biggest, most powerful drones that current technology can create, and they will do it all with economy of scale in production and maintenance of those drones.