Autonomous Robots Begin Testing For New Delivery Service

Posted by EditorDavid on Saturday April 16, 2016 @05:30PM from the the-robot-always-rings-twice dept.

An anonymous reader writes: "In the future, your food or package could be delivered by a coordinated fleet of self-driving vehicles," writes CBS Marketwatch, reporting on an "autonomous delivery startup" called Dispatch that's already begun pilot programs on two college campuses in California. A small droid-like vehicle "self-navigates the sidewalks at a pedestrian pace and uses cameras and LiDAR, a technology that measures distance using pulses of light, to avoid obstacles," according to site, noting that each robot in the fleet retains its data "and gets smarter with each trip." The company has already received $2 million in seed capital, and "What we're doing is we're using modern AI techniques to help the robot understand the world around it and react accordingly," one of the founders explains. "Once you imagine this it's hard to really imagine a future without it."

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Re:Start planning your landing pad in your backyar by drolli · 2016-04-17 09:29 · Score: 1, Insightful

I'm not too sure of sidewalk delivery but octocopters will be a thing. They are resilient to motor failures even while carrying a lot of weight.
No they wont. Sidewalk delivery is safe, energy efficient, and a drone can not easily lift a few hundred kg and still be allowed to fly over peoples heads.