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Retail giant Walmart has started testing drone delivery of grocery and household essential items with a small pilot program this week in Fayetteville, North Carolina.
Ina bid to take on Amazon drone delivery initiative, Walmart will be delivering “select grocery and household essential items” using automated drones operated by Israeli startup Flytrex.
“Our latest initiative has us exploring how drones can deliver items in a way that’s convenient, safe, and you guessed it fast,” Tom Ward, Senior Vice President, Customer Product, Walmart, said in a blog post.
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“The drones, which are controlled over the cloud using a smart and easy control dashboard, will help us gain valuable insight into the customer and associate experience, from picking and packing to takeoff and delivery,” Ward said.
Each of the drones can fly at speeds of 32 mph, travel distances of 6.2 miles in a round trip, and carry up to 6.6 pounds (that’s roughly “6-8 hamburgers,” according to converted units offered on Flytrex’s own website).
A demo video of the drone shows how it lowers packages to the ground from 80 feet in the air rather than having to land itself. Flytrex received approval from the FAA to test food deliveries in North Carolina last year, with caveats that its drones only fly predetermined routes in the daytime over unpopulated areas.
Walmart’s move comes at a time when e-commerce has gained prominence due to Covid-19 restrictions.
Walmart said that the learnings from pilots such as the one started in North Carolina will help shape the potential of drone delivery on a larger scale.
“We know that it will be some time before we see millions of packages delivered via drone,” Ward said.
“That still feels like a bit of science fiction, but we’re at a point where we’re learning more and more about the technology that is available and how we can use it to make our customers’ lives easier,” he added.
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