One of Alphabet's moonshot projects is an autonomous delivery drone service called Wing. As far as I can tell, they're only company offering this kind of service to the general public in North America -- though they are only operating in a few test locations in Virginia, Finland, and Australia.

Specifically:

• Canberra, Australia

• Logan, Australia

• Helsinki, Finland

• Christiansburg, United States

Not surprisingly, demand for Wing deliveries has surged during this pandemic. According to the Verge, the company made over 1,000 deliveries in the past two weeks, which represents a doubling of deliveries in the US and Australia. The most popular items seem to be essentials like toilet paper and coffee.

This is perhaps a good example of the argument that COVID-19 isn't going to change things per se, it will simply accelerate the adoption of things that were already in the process of happening. I was and am of the opinion that drones will become an integral part of delivery logistics. (Full disclosure: I own a bit of Alphabet and Drone Delivery Canada stock.)

There is still a lot that will need to happen. Alphabet/Wing is also working on an autonomous traffic management platform, because you obviously need something robust if you're going to scale this up. How you make this work in dense urban environments is also a whole other kettle of fish, though already people are starting to reconsider how rooftops are used.

For more on Wing, click here.

Image: Wing

Today, Drone Delivery Canada (TSXV: FLT) -- a company that I have written about before on the blog -- announced that it has entered into an exclusive 10-year agreement with Air Canada. Press release, here. Globe and Mail article, here. BNN Bloomberg article, here.

As part of the agreement, Air Canada Cargo will market, sell, and promote DDC's drone delivery services across the country using its sales and marketing platforms. It will be positioned as premium offering, and Air Canada has agreed not to engage any other drone delivery service during the term of the agreement.

This is a pretty big deal for DDC because it gives them distribution and legitimacy (they're a pre-revenue company). And for Air Canada, it is an opportunity to be a part of "Canada's first national drone cargo solution." The promise is a more cost-effective solution for servicing remote communities.

DDC plans to build out and operate up to 150,000 drone delivery routes across Canada as a result of this partnership. But, of course, it remains to be seen just how profitable these routes will be when they begin servicing their low-density communities.

Full disclosure: I am long $FLT because I think that what they are trying to build is very interesting and I think that better connectivity will be a positive thing for remote communities within Canada.

Photo by Ethan McArthur on Unsplash

Back in 2016, the United States Postal Service published a report on the public perception of drone delivery in the US. This was nearly 3 years after Jeff Bezos announced on 60 Minutes that Amazon was working on a drone delivery service and that it would arrive within the next 5 years (so by 2019). I think USPS was trying to figure out how to be, or appear, more innovative.

Not surprisingly, the report found that Millennials were significantly more supportive of drone delivery (65%) compared to Baby Boomers (24%), who strongly dislike the idea. Generally, the report indicates that the percentage of people who think it's a good idea declines with every preceding or older generation. Again, I don't find this at all surprising.

But what I did find interesting was that, irrespective of age, respondents were primarily concerned with some sort of "malfunction." This was at the top of the list. Next in line were concerns around "intentional misuse," such as drones being used to transport illicit goods or to spy on people and/or property.

Closer to the bottom of the list was a concern that drone delivery "might make the sky less pleasant to look at." My own view is that visual clutter and noise pollution are critical problems to address here. There's talk of "drone highways in the sky", but how do you really manage the sheer volume of drones that would be needed to service a dense urban environment?

Photo by Goh Rhy Yan on Unsplash