> But that truck can deliver hundreds of those boxes at a time. So it's one truck versus a huge swarm of drones. Well, it'd be multiple drones sure but "a huge

> But that truck can deliver hundreds of those boxes at a time. So it's one truck versus a huge swarm of drones. Well, it'd be multiple drones sure but "a huge swarm" is a bit of a stretch. 100 boxes might be 10 trips for 10 drones. At up to 50mph and a 20 mile round trip, they could get through quite a few trips. Just because there's the talk of "within 30 minutes" doesn't mean everything has to be done in 30 minutes. > (Some of which may drop that 1kg box on someone's head.) And some of the trucks will hit a kid in the road. Unless we're talking actual numbers and rates, any of these things are pretty useless for comparing the two methods. > Difficult to imagine a case for this delivery method other than pure instant gratification. Efficiencies, possibly? What's the energy cost of bringing a big truck with lots of parcels vs lots of smaller deliveries with lighter drones? How many people will travel into a city to buy an item currently sooner than it could be delivered? Could we cut out those trips? They're massively inefficient if you're driving, picking something up and just heading back. A physical item I want to send to someone fairly close by requires me to take it to someone to put into a system which moves it from building to building, through a distribution centre, then onto a truck to drive to their house. Or (though I don't actually have a car) I need to drive it there myself. Couldn't a drone just pick it up and take it there? Or a series of drone transfers?