Amazon has been secretly testing drone delivery services in the USA as it hopes to deliver 500 million packages a year, according to leaked documents obtained by Business Insider.
According to reports, Amazon intends to trial Prime Air drone delivery services in California and Texas. The documents claim drones will operate from 145 drone launchpads, which Amazon intends to construct.
Additionally, it was suggested that Amazon plans to delivery packages to 1,300 customers this year. Customers will be able to purchase around 3,000 items for drone delivery, including beauty items, pharmaceutical products and pet supplies weighing under 5lb.
Packages would be delivered one at a time, within an hour to the selected customers, the report suggests.
Furthermore, Amazon plans to reach at least 12,000 total test flights by the end of the year, with approximately 5,000 commercial flights for trial customers. The remainder will be used for durability and reliability testing.
Launched in 2013, Prime Air has been plagued by numerous missed deadlines and UK drone delivery operations were grounded in August 2021, with redundancies and transfers made.
