Courier company Aramex is partnering with Bulgarian startup Dronamics, a cargo drone airline, to introduce a long-range same-day, remotely piloted delivery option to new regions, including South Africa.
This was announced in a post on the Dronamics website last week.
The Black Swan drone that the company has developed can take off and land in a 400-metre space, requires no pilot and can carry a 350-kilogramme load for a distance of 2 500 kilometres.
Dronamics claims this can be done 80% faster, 50% cheaper, and with 60% less emissions than alternative transport methods, such as airfreight.
The fact that the drone can land on such a short runway means that it can operate in underserved areas with a lack of airport infrastructure.
It is not clear when Aramex and Dronamics plan to begin operating in South Africa. The companies will first explore joint deployment opportunities in the United Arab Emirates before branching out to South Africa and Australia.
Aramex hopes to begin piloting flights with Dronamics in 2024.
Despite the promise of drone technology for logistics services, the technology is yet to be used on a large scale.
Amazon Prime Air only operates in two cities in the United States, but plans to expand the offering in 2024 to the United Kingdom and Italy.
A subsidiary of Alphabet called Wing is also growing its fleet of delivery drones. The company partnered with Walmart in August to use lightweight autonomous drones to make deliveries from two stores in the Dallas metro area.
A project launched by the South African National Blood Service to deliver blood to hard-to-reach areas by drone was delayed by five years.
Issues such as the construction of a hospital, regulatory hurdles, and a lack of drone operators resulted in the delay.
[Photo: dronamics.com]