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 Flight Forward's maiden delivery flight on Friday in Cary, North
Carolina, beat rivals in one phase of the race for the nascent
market. The second drone flight delivered medications to a public
space at a retirement community.
The packages, roughly the size of small shoeboxes, were lowered from
drones hovering at an altitude of about 20 feet.
UPS and CVS said on Tuesday the deliveries were the first of their
kind under an program approved by the U.S. Federal Aviation
Administration (FAA). Regulators are still hammering out rules for
how the unmanned winged vehicles will operate in U.S. airspace and
guidelines are expected in 2021.
"We see big potential in drone delivery in rural communities where
life-saving medications are needed and consumers at times cannot
conveniently access one of our stores," said Kevin Hourican,
president of CVS Pharmacy.
"CVS is exploring many types of delivery options for urban, suburban
and rural markets," Hourican added.
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In September, UPS became the first company to win the broadest FAA
certification to operate a drone airline. That permits Flight
Forward to collect payment for drone deliveries and to fly as many
drones supported by as many operators as necessary to meet customer
demand.
Flight Forward and drone startup Matternet have inked a variety of
deals to deliver biological samples on a handful of medical
campuses.
Wing, a drone operator owned by Google parent Alphabet Inc <GOOGL.O>,
is partnering with Walgreens <WBA.O> and FedEx Corp <FDX.N> for a
home delivery pilot in Christiansburg, Virginia.
(Reporting by Lisa Baertlein in Los Angeles; Editing by David
Gregorio)
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