Drones first appeared in the early 20th century and were used as a one-time exploration tool that could not return. With the development of electronic technology, drones have gradually acquired the capabilities of remote control, return to home, carrying cargo, and flying beyond visual line of sight, and have subsequently shined in the digital transformation of various traditional industries such as agriculture, forestry, animal husbandry, and fishery.

At this year's World Artificial Intelligence Conference, more than 20 robot products were unveiled, including the fourth-generation drone just released by Meituan. This multi-rotor drone, which focuses on urban low-altitude logistics, will shorten the delivery time of takeaways within a 3-kilometer radius to less than 15 minutes.

Meituan exhibits at WAIC2023 with urban low-altitude logistics solutions

Deliver takeout on the sky highway

To a certain extent, Meituan drones go hand in hand with instant retail.

"Buy now and get it now" has become a new consumption habit in people's daily life. For real-time retail companies represented by Meituan, the peak single-day orders have already exceeded 60 million. In the new real-time retail format of "order online and deliver offline within 30 minutes", rapid satisfaction of consumer needs is the core.

However, as the scale of cities continues to expand, the speed limitations of ground transportation and congestion that occur from time to time have set a speed limit for "instantaneous" speed. In order to meet people's ever-escalating demand for speed, Meituan turned to using drones to build an urban three-dimensional distribution network in mid-air 120 meters above the ground to achieve higher fulfillment efficiency.

Mao Yianyi, head of Meituan’s drone business, described this as “road construction in the air.”

However, it is not that easy to build a "road" in the air.

Meituan’s fourth-generation drone is delivering goods

Drone food delivery must not only complete the transportation from point A to point B, but also must go through the entire process of food loading, dispatching, aerial flight, and back-end operation and maintenance. At the press conference, Meituan explained in detail its urban low-altitude logistics solutions. What it hopes to build is not just a drone, but an urban low-altitude logistics network that integrates aircraft, ground undertaking devices and route management back-end systems, which can provide end-to-end retail of goods under 2.5 kilograms within a radius of 3 kilometers. Items are delivered and delivered within 15 minutes.

According to public reports, in the past two years, the retail categories that have been "sent to the sky highway" cover dozens of categories such as milk tea, coffee, ramen, grilled fish, sushi, diapers, etc., with 20,000 categories available for delivery, and a total of 167,000 orders delivered. , service scenarios include various types of communities, business districts, scenic spots, etc. in Shenzhen and Shanghai.

Food delivery has high concurrency requirements. In order to ensure the safety of multiple drones operating at the same time, Meituan has developed a "time and space capsule" that can support up to hundreds of drones operating in the same area at the same time, ensuring that any two drones can operate in real time. The routes of drones will not overlap at any time or anywhere. With the support of this technology, large-scale drone delivery will be possible.

3 iterations in 3 years

Adaptable to 97% of domestic urban low-altitude environments

In recent years, Meituan UAV has maintained an average research and development rate of one new model per year.

In 2019, Meituan’s first-generation drone was born, and in 2020, the first milk tea delivery process was demonstrated.

In 2021, Meituan released its second-generation drone and delivered the first real user takeout order. In the same year, it participated in the World Artificial Intelligence Conference and the concept of "Urban Low-altitude Logistics Network" was formed.

Subsequently, in the past two years of continuous operation, how to meet users' needs for instant drone delivery services in special weather has become the development direction of continuous iteration of technology.

In 2022, Meituan released its third-generation drone, which is currently the main model responsible for low-altitude delivery work and can continue to operate in rain and snow. The fourth-generation new model has undergone more than two years of research and development, and has been greatly improved in terms of delivery radius, load capacity, speed, and resistance to bad weather.

Meituan drones have previously carried out activities in Shenzhen scenic spots

The maximum delivery distance of the fourth-generation new model is about 5 kilometers, which is nearly 35% higher than the previous generation. At the same time, it can safely perform delivery tasks in weather such as "moderate rain and moderate snow"; the optimization of aerodynamic design and power system makes the new machine The model can withstand up to level 7 winds and effectively cope with high-speed "drafts" that appear in the gaps between high-rise buildings; the configuration of a high-dynamic and high-sensitivity camera also allows the new model to accurately position and sense its surroundings in a dim environment where "you can only see your five fingers" obstacle.

In short, the fourth-generation new model allows consumers to receive takeaways delivered by drones in a timely manner in bad weather such as low light, strong winds, rain and snow .

At the same time, in order to reduce the impact on the surrounding environment, the new model has changed the blade design to reduce flight noise by about 50% while extending its service life. The effect from 50 meters away is like two people talking face to face.

Hidden low-altitude economic potential

It has been more than 100 years since humans entered the sky, and it has been more than half a century since humans entered the universe. Up to now, human flight capabilities are mainly reflected in long-distance and high-altitude flight. Due to technical, policy and other reasons, low-altitude flight of 120 meters in the city has not been fully developed.

Meituan is not the only company targeting low-altitude airspace. According to statistics from the Qianzhan Industry Research Institute, in 2015, industrial-grade drones (low-altitude flying) accounted for less than 20% of the domestic civilian drone market. By 2020, this number has grown to more than 40%.

Among foreign companies, Google’s brother company Wing realized commercial use of drone express delivery in 2019, transporting food and medicine to cities and towns in Virginia, Texas and Australia. As of October 2022, Wing has completed 300,000 commercial delivery orders. After nine years of research and development and testing, Amazon's drones will officially launch commercial drone delivery services in cities and towns in California and Texas on Christmas 2022.

In China, the first operating points of SF Express Logistics and JD.com’s drone business are also set to be located in mountainous rural areas to deliver seasonal agricultural products, express delivery and other goods to local villagers.

Logistics drone developed by Wing, a subsidiary of Google parent company Alphabet

However, unlike these companies, Meituan drones have shifted their delivery scenarios from rural and suburban areas to urban business circles with higher demand, making technology research and development and safe operations more difficult. But in terms of business results, it's worth it.

Previously, the urban low-altitude logistics solution proposed by Meituan has been approved by the Civil Aviation Administration of China and obtained the "Approval Letter for Trial Operation of Specific UAVs" and the "General Aviation Enterprise Business License" issued by the authority. This means that Meituan UAV has become a general cargo airline and can start commercial operations.

Currently, Meituan has about 100 drones in total. Mao Yiyi believes that Meituan drones will achieve large-scale commercial operation in five years, and more users will enjoy more convenient services.

How far is it from the explosion of the 100 billion market?

More than ten years ago, drones were still far away from ordinary people - civilian drones accounted for less than 10% of China's drone market. According to estimates, the market size of industrial drones has exceeded 200 billion yuan. Today, Meituan’s drone business has been invested in research and development for 6 years and has been operating in real scenarios for 2 years. How far is it from large-scale operation?

The answer given by Mao Yianyi is that large-scale operation of drones is expected to be realized in three to five years. In this process, drones still need to overcome various difficulties.

For example, after large-scale operations, the technical problems that need to be solved will become more complex.

"If a drone lands somewhere where children can reach out and touch it, how to prevent risks. Therefore, we have to consider what can be used to separate people from the aircraft, so that it can provide services without causing safety risks by touching the aircraft. "Relevant technical personnel of Meituan said that the lengthy user education is another line that Meituan needs to focus on simultaneously. In community scenarios, the elderly and children are the two most difficult groups of people to understand drones. They will use small model toys to explain to children what drone delivery is.

The drone in the opening scene of Ready Player One

150 years ago, no one could have imagined that airplanes would become the main means of transportation for long-distance travel. 250 years ago, the first steam car was ridiculed when it tried to keep pace with horse-drawn carriages. In the movie "Ready Player One", director Spielberg's imagination of ordinary people's daily lives in 2025 is "pizza delivery with drones." When will the imagination become reality? let us wait and see.