I don't see this happening anytime soon. There's no way they can ensure safe deliver with a small drone. You know how many people are going to try to shoot them down, steal what they have... And how does it know where to drop your package? It also bring attention to the house, especially if it's valuable.
Wouldn't the NTSB administration have to give approval? Perhaps they would receive permission in one state use small sized drones to to test the air. If there weren't any crashes or failures then perhaps the NTSB would allow Amazon to use small sized drones to deliver packages.
There's too much liability for this to work out well for Amazon. Drones feature navigation systems that are fairly easy to hack into, at least for consumer and commercial drones. Good luck hacking into a military drone on your own, though. It's a clever idea, but the logistics are too much to handle. Plus, Amazon is already overvalued, and I think a test program would only make investors more wary of what the company is doing to generate real profits.
Technology wise, the idea of a drone delivering my package is a neat idea, but I would not want a drone coming to my house. There are too many privacy violation risks and I would not feel comfortable.
Wait, if a drone crashes on my property delivering a package, then do I get extra compensation for my troubles? Because then I wouldn't mind Amazon using drones. ;]
I agree with this... and it's the majority of what I've heard. So I really do wonder why Amazon thought it would work and put so much money in it. *OR* am I naive and it was just a publicity stunt? I mean it sure wouldn't be free delivery and we can already pay for overnight delivery, so... I see no purpose and it feels very much like them wasting money to me.
Amazon needs to put more money into research and development. The company needs to figure out a way to start pulling in real profits rather than poor profits. The company brings in so much money in revenue, yet operating costs are nearly as high, so they profit very little. Amazon stock is currently inflated by a wide margin. If the company figured out how to become truly profitable, then the stock would easily soar to new highs.
I think that drones are a great delivery method, if they are tested as reliable and no one can operate them remotely from outside Amazon, why not? Just cut costs.
I'm pretty sure their profit is more than any other online company, and are already truly profitable. I mean, they're doing so well that they have no real competitors, and are pushing mom and pop book stores out of business.
Their actual bottom line profits have long been slim. Their sales / revenues have always been very impressive. Retail in general is a high-volume, low-margin business. And when you factor in shipping costs, it becomes even more of a low-margin game.
