A few days ago, the streets of Irvine, Southern California, appeared as a squad of robots called Scott, delivering goods, packages and purchases from the last collection points to their owners' homes and homes, in what is known as the “last mile” to deliver goods, or The last stage in transport and distribution. This division of robots is affiliated with Amazon, which has been officially granted the right to publish and manage it in the streets of the region, to serve the subscribers of the service «Prime Prime», one of the distinctive programs for the purchase, transport and distribution of the company, which makes the company dispensed with trucks and cars in deliveries «Last Mile» .

According to reports published in recent days at a number of major technology sites, «Amazon» is lagging in the race to robots to deliver goods «last mile». In fact, it is the third company in the world in this context, where earlier this year «Star Ship Technologies», deployed robots band in London, and campus «George Mason» University of Maryland, to transport packages and goods for students and teachers.

Reflection AI also deployed a robotics squad on the Michigan State University campus for the same purpose, which preceded a limited experimental squad that Amazon briefly deployed in a Washington neighborhood.

Technical masterpiece

Scott's robots, published by Amazon in California, have been described by analysts as a "technical masterpiece." The robot is equipped with a package of standard sensors, GPS, several stereo cameras, inertial meters, and a LEDar system. »To explore the road, walking on six wheels is as fast as humans.

The robot also uses radar and ultrasonic sensors for greater safety. In terms of size, it seems sufficient to accommodate small and medium parcels, and with the «Amazon» to take this step, and enter the field operation of robots in this way on the streets, it is almost certain, as many experts believe, that the founder and president of «Amazon», Jeff Bezos, Amazon will be the main publisher of autonomous, uninhabited land-based robots that transport goods and parcels as a way to reduce the number of cars on the road and get them out of distribution in the last mile. This will bring many environmental benefits, by reducing vehicle exhaust and street noise, because robots are powered by electricity and do not emit noise or exhaust.

reaction

"Scott's robots will transport packages independently from urban distribution points to Amazon Prime customers, eliminating the need for trucks and cars to deliver the last mile," Amazon said in a statement. Independently, a group of humans will accompany Scott's robots to gauge the public's response to robots, a hidden factor to be prepared for, to ensure the success of plans to deploy autonomous mobile robots on city streets and deal with any unexpected errors between humans and robots during operation » .

Competition on the sidewalk

The editors of ZDNet, a technology specialist, carried out a "field living" for Scott's robotics squad during its early days on the streets of California. According to the observations in the field cohabitation report, the most important challenges facing robots are that they compete with pedestrians on the pavement area, as well as with cyclists on the bike path. Because they can not walk in the fast lane of cars, here is expected to clash with restrictions placed by the legislative bodies and local authorities in the cities, which are trying to make access to the sidewalk and bicycle paths easy, and tracks as free as possible.

A challenge is that robots have been tested in controlled work environments, such as carefully selected neighborhoods or on campus. The streets of the cities represent an open environment, with many obstacles, including huge craters, crossing areas and intersections, the possibility of sabotage and negative reactions from pedestrians.

«Star Ship»

Founded in 2014, Star Ship Technologies produced and operated the Star Ship robot to distribute parcels and merchandise in the last mile on the campus of George Mason University in Maryland. The robot operates on six wheels and runs completely autonomous. So far, the Star Ship robots have traveled 100,000 kilometers inside the university and in one area of ​​London.

At Mason University, robotics specialize in distributing food products to more than 40,000 students and faculty who communicate with the university's restaurants and cafes via a mobile app.

Reflection AA

Reflection AI delivered a delivery robot called RIV-1, which it said was intended for walking on bicycle lanes and on both sides of the road. The company's founders, Matthew Johnson Roberson and Ram Vasudevan, professors at the University of Michigan, said the robot is lightweight, easy to move and fast enough to work on the bicycle lane on both sides of the road, and is five feet long, 4.5 feet high, 30 inches wide, and can Carrying weight up to 100 lbs, traveling at 15 mph.

«REF-1»

The founders of the company, Matthew Johnson Roberson, and Ram Vasudevan, professors at the University of «Michigan», said that the robot «RV-1» depends on a distance of five feet, compared to the usual shutdown distance of 45 feet, which may require a large vehicle With the same speed to avoid accidents, it is a safer, more efficient and less costly solution for “last mile” logistics than any other robot.

Robots are equipped with 6 wheels and road sensors.