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Amazon’s squadron of delivery drones was supposed to be in full flight by now. And the fall of 2021 would have been an opportune time to have little automated flying machines delivering packages to customers—what with all the trouble human workers are causing around the country with strikes and labor shortages. Amazon announced an experimental drone delivery service with great fanfare as part of a 60 Minutes feature in 2013. Amazon’s promise was quite remarkable: Your packages—containing anything from toothpaste to a new smartphone—would arrive right at your doorstep (or on your lawn) by way of a drone that lands, drops your parcel and flies away.
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Jeff Bezos, Amazon’s then-CEO, said in the televised segment that it would likely take “four to five years” to turn the “R&D project” into a reality.
Nearly eight years later, the world’s leading online retailer is struggling to make progress with its Prime Air program. So, what happened?
“Prime Air is committed to making our goal of delivering packages by drones a reality,” Amazon said in a statement to TIME. “We are pioneering new ground and it will continue to take time to create the right technology and infrastructure to safely deliver packages to customers.”
Since the program got underway, Amazon has revealed a few delivery-drone designs, and in August of 2020 it received the Federal Aviation Administration’s permission to begin conducting drone operations. The company told TIME that it continues to collaborate closely with the FAA and other regulatory bodies around the world. It is running tests of the delivery program and has logged thousands of flight hours.
Even so, Prime Air has suffered numerous setbacks, including rounds of layoffs, unexpected surges in workload, and a work environment fueled by unrealistic expectations, former staffers told Wired earlier this year.
Projects that take longer than expected to get off the ground are hardly unusual at big companies, and…
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Source : time
