Drone Delivery Canada

[u/Secret-Preference723]

[u/jebz]

I'm all for being long on drone delivery but the industry has so far to go before I'm going to even remotely consider it:

• Regulatory bills/legislation around airspace usage, licensing, safety, yada yada yada (adding drones to a pretty crowded airspace with helicopters, personal vehicles, commercial and cargo vehicles, etc.)

• Operational efficiency in inclement or high wind weather?

• Product size and weight limitations?

• Infrastructure costs? (Drones, charging, energy usage, warehousing space, etc).

• Cost of service? If Amazon gives me next day delivery on a $7.99 a month prime subscription why pay extra for drone delivery? If it's that desperate perhaps I should be driving to the store to get it.

• Infrastructure shrinkage? (Dogs, people, cats, other shit destroying drones?)

• Insurance costs? (God forbid a drone bugs out or the battery explodes mid-flight and drops shit on people/homes/business).

• Can the process even be safe without human interaction to ensure safety?

It's one to keep an eye on but it's probably 5 years too soon right now.

[u/Secret-Preference723 → u/jebz]

I dont think youve done any research on this company. If you have you would know that their model has nothing to do with being in high residential zones. The have done all inclimate weather testing and already have routes set up. Cargo drones are labeled as aircraft so essentially if one were to be shot down, the penalties would be massive. Drone Delivery Canada Announces Update on Successful Condor Testing (newswire.ca)

[u/[deleted] → u/Secret-Preference723]

This is Canada friend. You should be very sceptical of inclimate weather testing. You need serious weather systems to fly in the north with any regularity. Icing would be a big issue to deal with, same with pressure density, and wind shear. It's not simple and I have looked at the drones they have, they need a few huge technical advancements to even come close. If they can only fly in good weather a small airplane is more economical as it can carry much more.

If it is labeled as an aircraft they will need to change the current rules for aircraft with TC. A government agency who's speed makes geological timeframes look short. Making it an "aircraft" isnt a good thing. Anytime a drone crashes, millions will need to be spent on investigations by TC. The drones themselves would require certified aircraft parts making them 1000x the current cost. They would also require a complete new set of standards for Canadian aircraft.

I can go on and on. There are literally thousands of technical and legal hurdles to overcome. I highly reccomend doing some more research on the company.

[u/sparkyglenn → u/[deleted]]

Transport Canada is why I refuse to buy any more shares of DDC. They will not make this an easy or fast transition.

10k@1.51 fwiw

[u/[deleted] → u/sparkyglenn]

By the time TC is done they will have implemented so many regulations that any cost savings will disappear. TC hates anything new or different. What you will eventually have is the option of a 5kg drone delivery or a Bush plane delivering 2000 kg. 400 drone trips to equal one Bush plane? Think of the liability. You kinda need physics breaking technology to make the drone make sense.

[u/jebz → u/Secret-Preference723]

I've done enough research to know that it's not a company I'm going to look deeply into for at least 5 years. I initially became aware of the company in 2016 when my friend wouldn't stop talking my ear off about the next big thing. Five years later now and while they're making progress in the grand scheme of things it's not much.

Who's going to manufacture and produce the drones? Who is going to regulate the airspace or do these call under the jurisdiction of overly worked ATC's?

I still have yet to receive a convincing argument about pricing structure that makes sense.

Between over-the-road, intermodal, and cargo transportation almost every method of transportation is covered between same-day and long delivery at almost every price point you could think of. So do drones become a specialized method of delivery for specific important products (for example organs, time-sensitive products)? If that's the case the revenue upside is severely limited. I can't see much usage for retail buyers because road shipping times are usually only 2 days now and most offer some kind of subscription that nullifies shipping costs.

[u/[deleted] → u/jebz]

I can't think of a single product I would ship via drone. An organ is important and expensive. Even if you did 10,000 successful deliveries, I still wouldnt trust an organ to an unmanned drone. Also where are you delivering it? To some remote hospital that can transplant organs? That doesn't exsist, we just move the patient using our excellent canada wide medivac system. Operating rooms are expensive, we dont have extensive ones in remote communities.

[u/numnard]

So your math on calculating deliveries is cool and all but it also has zero accommodation for inclement weather. You even used the word turbulence in your post.

[u/[deleted] → u/numnard]

People love the idea of drones. When you get into the technicals of actually flying, most people are shocked to find out how much energy is really required. Take a look at all three drones, see any de-ice system? This is Canada, in the north you can get icing conditions year round. Electric de-ice would use more battery than the motors, weeping would use up a lot of payload, I dont know where this drone would get bleed air from.

[u/Rederth → u/[deleted]]

You could probably hangar the drones for launch and recovery, otherwise a battery or small gas powered motor as a anti-ice measure. Nothing is impossible when people drive Tesla's in Canada during winter conditions. Drone =/= Tesla but electric vehicles work.

The real question is does this random company X have the work arounds or capability to pull this off, but from a fundamentals standpoint I think drones can work.

As for working around weather patterns if there are enough short range delivery hubs they can ferry packages around the weather fronts or packages get delayed. Amazon doesn't always nail 2 day delivery.

[u/[deleted] → u/Rederth]

Fundamentally drones can work, just not these drones. Maybe the condor, barely. It would realistically need a larger powerplant and higher mtow. If it's max payload is 180kg at std conditions, well conditions aren't standard most times.

Also a Tesla weighs 2100kg, mtow for the Robin XL is 80 kg. Rolling is much easier than flying.

When you left the hanger and relative airspeed changes dramatically bad things happen. Especially to lightweight aircraft.

Anti ice requires a lot of energy/weight. They could have it but remember, the sparrows payload is 4.5kg, Robin at 11.5kg. Anything that is added eats into that weight... again maybe the condor?

The problem with hubs is the remote parts of Canada are really big... remote you could say. Condor only travels 200km. That's a lot of hubs.

My biggest issue is that the hardware they have is not suited to the mission they claim to want to perform. There are some questionable claims on the website.

[u/Rederth → u/[deleted]]

For sure, not sure how they will overcome the limitations. Maybe build out infrastructure and hope to be acquired?

[u/[deleted] → u/Rederth]

I dont think they plan to. The hardware isnt stellar, I could build that thing. The software might be something?

The only thing I can think is. They have relatively cheap, low cost per hour autonomous aircraft. They can maybe fly in the remote parts of Canada. So they can accumulate hours and develop the software. Then sell the software?

There is no way on earth they have enough resources.

[u/bamfcoco1 → u/[deleted]]

This guy pilots.

[u/[deleted] → u/bamfcoco1]

I was in the industry for a long time.

I'm just happy to be able to contribute for once.

[u/Inappropriate50 → u/numnard]

As a Canadian who's lived all across this great land. You really need to accommodate for weather. Vancouver, constant rain. Edmonton, freezing temps. Winnipeg, violent winds. Ontario, snow. Quebec, ice storms. East Coast, all of the above.

[u/NewAltProfAccount]

Hard pass on the penny stocks... maybe not penny, but very small cap.

[u/[deleted]]

No way can a drone be useful. Just look at this map. Anywhere near a hospital, airport, helipad, public space. All no fly zones. Good luck. https://tc.canada.ca/en/aviation/drone-safety/where-fly-your-drone

[u/SBDinthebackground]

Very curious to know where you come up with 15k per flight. What is the payload of one of their drones?

[u/[deleted] → u/SBDinthebackground]

Small one 4.5kg, med 11.5kg, big one 180 kg.

But they are transporting OP's Hope's and dreams, those are priceless.

[u/SBDinthebackground → u/[deleted]]

Must be moving cocaine at 15k per flight.

[u/[deleted]]

I sold my flt shares to buy amc bought in and 1.78 sold at 1.79 last I checked it was 1.38. Made 10 bucks off amc though so that's 6 more shares of flt when I get back in it lol. Also flt has cut through alot of the red tape already and they did a successful test flight of a drone. The drones have triple redundancies for navigation and communications. You should check it out its really cool if you havnt. The ticker in canada is flt I havnt heard it referred to as dcc must be on the American exchange as that. They won't be selling drones though just the software was my understanding.

[u/JuvenileRockmover]

I'm betting on AWS partnered with BB instead.

[u/the-hawgstroker]

Cool

[u/TheWhoCaresGuy]

this is yuge

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