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FedEx is both an established airline AND one of the most trusted logistics companies on the planet. So Amazon can beat them when they can do this on demand: ht

FedEx is both an established airline AND one of the most trusted logistics companies on the planet. So Amazon can beat them when they can do this on demand: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J-qPtWc4heA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J-qPtWc4heA For brevity: the above purports to show a time lapse of FedEx's fleet of DC-10s, Airbus A310s etc - packed with fuel, valuables and people - scrambling for the Memphis, TN hub and hooking in handily around a massive angry thunderstorm. It looks like a perfectly organized, well timed dance - with incredibly high stakes. edit: clarity.

erelde 10y ago
The Fedex courier in my area has been consistently bad for years and doesn't get fired. Two weeks ago: doesn't come, doesn't leave a notice, two days in a row, claiming he came, I had a to exchange some salty emails with customer service to get my package. Each time I had to use Fedex these last 3 years I've had to do this cycle. On the other hand I have developped a "good relationship" with the UPS courier.
- gambiting 10y ago
  The thing is, people like you and me are not primary customers of Fedex. Corporate is where it's at - when I worked at an oil refinery in Scotland, engineers would request parts that had to be literally delivered ASAP, and refinery didn't think twice about paying a bill in thousands of pounds for overnight delivery of few parts from US.
- dfsegoat 10y ago
  As a logistics manager - I would constantly switch between the two, depending on who could get me the best rate for our most common small package parcel sizes, etc. They constantly alternate between "the best" and "shitty".
- waterphone 10y ago
  I live in quite a remote area, with UPS and FedEx drivers that are driving hundreds of miles per day on their route, often starting over 100 miles away, and yet they're both consistently excellent. They virtually never miss delivery estimates, and often exceed them. I'm honestly quite impressed with them, especially considering a moderate amount of their route is also on fairly poor quality dirt roads.
  - erelde 10y ago
    I still "trust" FedEx as a company, but the delivery man in charge of my area is sh*t.
- devy 10y ago
  I have the EXACT OPPOSITE experience in my neighthood - FedEx always deliver package above and beyond but UPS has been shitty ALL THE TIME. I live in Northen NJ.
eloisant 10y ago
It is really FedEx who organizes that, or the air controllers in Memphis dealing with pilots directly?
- CPLX 10y ago
  I'm a licensed pilot. What's interesting about that video has literally nothing to do with Fedex. It's a demonstration of the skill of the center and approach controllers at Memphis during inclement weather.
  - dfsegoat 10y ago
    I know. I get that -- I think my point was more to demonstrate that FedEx is an airline first - logistics company 2nd - in terms of air freight.
abajaj2280 10y ago
algorithms are way better at controlling traffic than humans. what you're seeing is just the best so far
read_only_sofar 10y ago
I don't see the point of that video. a) If anything, it is not a feat of Company, but of nowadays IFR systems in cooperation with ATC guys who probably sweated off at least 10 pounds during that shift. b) Each and every airline does that, from top notch VIP charters to those we-are-declaring-emergency-because-our-company-doesn't-let-us-take-in-enough-fuel-so-we-are-landing-RIGHT-NOW-GET-OFF-OUR-WAY poor souls piloting Ryanairs. c) Aviation is a market. If you pay, you get aircrafts and pilots. If you pay good, you get good pilots. That's it. d) This is very inside the box thinking. An equivalent of this would be showing a video of a bunch of guys running to the local hardware shop, hastily throwing HW boxes into a car, driving fast and furious back to the site, assembling a server, plugging it in, installing OS and presenting it to the customer: here, your server. So Amazon can beat them only when they can do all of this on demand? No, they just built the AWS and "on demand" now means just clicking "I want an instance now" or even letting a balancer spin that up for you, done. The article is talking about 15 years horizon and although that is a very brave speculation of Amazon's business plans and future events, just think about what 15 years means. 15 years ago, Windows XP has just RTMed a week before. GPS meant some ugly expensive box waiting an eternity to get a fix. Common large and heavy desktop crates called personal computers struggled with even playing a DivX video in CRT resolution. Capturing overhead footage meant flying an expensive helicopter running on expensive fuel and operated by highly trained pilot. Nowadays, you can buy an entire device called "quadcopter" for less than an hour of helicopter flight time and fly around and videotape everything like in a computer game. We have small slates of glass called "smartphones" that smoothly play 2880x2160 videos while projecting them onto a 3D surface twice (VR phone-based headsets) or even smoothly render an entire VR game scene from polygons. We have cars using half as much fuel. You can tap on your slate of glass and a car arrives for you. In 15 years we can have supertough drones flying right through hurricanes, micro hyperloops moving small cargo around entire states, warehouses on every other corner with duplicated stock, carpooling packet delivery services like some Uber-Fedex hybrid, or even outright cargo teleports spitting out pizzas from local restaurants, shoe orders from Amazon and hell monsters from Mars military bases with id Software calling out software patents on that and claiming intellectual property on 50% of incoming daemons... Sorry for long post - basically what I wanted to say is that everybody can do that with airplanes.
- 10y ago
SSLy 10y ago
needs more 64kbps mp3 audio.
onion2k 10y ago
What's stopping Amazon doing the same thing over the next few years? They have the resources to buy some planes and write some software to schedule them. The hard thing would be negotiating with airports to get the same level of access that FedEx enjoys. I don't see what that would be a particularly big problem - it comes down to the fees they're willing to pay.

erelde 10y ago

The Fedex courier in my area has been consistently bad for years and doesn't get fired. Two weeks ago: doesn't come, doesn't leave a notice, two days in a row, claiming he came, I had a to exchange some salty emails with customer service to get my package. Each time I had to use Fedex these last 3 years I've had to do this cycle. On the other hand I have developped a "good relationship" with the UPS courier.

gambiting 10y ago
The thing is, people like you and me are not primary customers of Fedex. Corporate is where it's at - when I worked at an oil refinery in Scotland, engineers would request parts that had to be literally delivered ASAP, and refinery didn't think twice about paying a bill in thousands of pounds for overnight delivery of few parts from US.
dfsegoat 10y ago
As a logistics manager - I would constantly switch between the two, depending on who could get me the best rate for our most common small package parcel sizes, etc. They constantly alternate between "the best" and "shitty".
waterphone 10y ago
I live in quite a remote area, with UPS and FedEx drivers that are driving hundreds of miles per day on their route, often starting over 100 miles away, and yet they're both consistently excellent. They virtually never miss delivery estimates, and often exceed them. I'm honestly quite impressed with them, especially considering a moderate amount of their route is also on fairly poor quality dirt roads.
- erelde 10y ago
  I still "trust" FedEx as a company, but the delivery man in charge of my area is sh*t.
devy 10y ago
I have the EXACT OPPOSITE experience in my neighthood - FedEx always deliver package above and beyond but UPS has been shitty ALL THE TIME. I live in Northen NJ.

eloisant 10y ago

It is really FedEx who organizes that, or the air controllers in Memphis dealing with pilots directly?

CPLX 10y ago
I'm a licensed pilot. What's interesting about that video has literally nothing to do with Fedex. It's a demonstration of the skill of the center and approach controllers at Memphis during inclement weather.
- dfsegoat 10y ago
  I know. I get that -- I think my point was more to demonstrate that FedEx is an airline first - logistics company 2nd - in terms of air freight.

abajaj2280 10y ago

algorithms are way better at controlling traffic than humans. what you're seeing is just the best so far

read_only_sofar 10y ago

I don't see the point of that video. a) If anything, it is not a feat of Company, but of nowadays IFR systems in cooperation with ATC guys who probably sweated off at least 10 pounds during that shift. b) Each and every airline does that, from top notch VIP charters to those we-are-declaring-emergency-because-our-company-doesn't-let-us-take-in-enough-fuel-so-we-are-landing-RIGHT-NOW-GET-OFF-OUR-WAY poor souls piloting Ryanairs. c) Aviation is a market. If you pay, you get aircrafts and pilots. If you pay good, you get good pilots. That's it. d) This is very inside the box thinking. An equivalent of this would be showing a video of a bunch of guys running to the local hardware shop, hastily throwing HW boxes into a car, driving fast and furious back to the site, assembling a server, plugging it in, installing OS and presenting it to the customer: here, your server. So Amazon can beat them only when they can do all of this on demand? No, they just built the AWS and "on demand" now means just clicking "I want an instance now" or even letting a balancer spin that up for you, done. The article is talking about 15 years horizon and although that is a very brave speculation of Amazon's business plans and future events, just think about what 15 years means. 15 years ago, Windows XP has just RTMed a week before. GPS meant some ugly expensive box waiting an eternity to get a fix. Common large and heavy desktop crates called personal computers struggled with even playing a DivX video in CRT resolution. Capturing overhead footage meant flying an expensive helicopter running on expensive fuel and operated by highly trained pilot. Nowadays, you can buy an entire device called "quadcopter" for less than an hour of helicopter flight time and fly around and videotape everything like in a computer game. We have small slates of glass called "smartphones" that smoothly play 2880x2160 videos while projecting them onto a 3D surface twice (VR phone-based headsets) or even smoothly render an entire VR game scene from polygons. We have cars using half as much fuel. You can tap on your slate of glass and a car arrives for you. In 15 years we can have supertough drones flying right through hurricanes, micro hyperloops moving small cargo around entire states, warehouses on every other corner with duplicated stock, carpooling packet delivery services like some Uber-Fedex hybrid, or even outright cargo teleports spitting out pizzas from local restaurants, shoe orders from Amazon and hell monsters from Mars military bases with id Software calling out software patents on that and claiming intellectual property on 50% of incoming daemons... Sorry for long post - basically what I wanted to say is that everybody can do that with airplanes.

10y ago

SSLy 10y ago

needs more 64kbps mp3 audio.

onion2k 10y ago

What's stopping Amazon doing the same thing over the next few years? They have the resources to buy some planes and write some software to schedule them. The hard thing would be negotiating with airports to get the same level of access that FedEx enjoys. I don't see what that would be a particularly big problem - it comes down to the fees they're willing to pay.