Hasta La Gadget!

Back in December when Amazon announced that it wanted to use drones to deliver packages to Prime users in only 30 minutes, many folks thought that sounded farfetched. Word has now surfaced from the United Arab Emirates (UAE) that the government wants to trial its own delivery service in Dubai using drones.

The service would feature drone aircraft to deliver items to citizens such as driver’s licenses and other government documents. A prototype drone was unveiled this week and the UAE government plans to test the drone for six months.

The battery-powered quadrotor will carry packages in an upper cargo compartment. It also will have fingerprint scanners and retina scanners to ensure delivery to the correct person. The team behind the drones says they could cost as little as $1100(USD) each, and carry loads up to 3.3 pounds distances up to 1.86 miles.

Assuming a successful test in Dubai, the government wants to roll the drone aircraft out to the remainder of the country in the next year.

[via The National via The Verge]

With the holiday season upon us, we’re sure many of you have learned by now that the best way to do any of your holiday shopping this year is through online retailers. The only problem with trusting your holiday shopping to online retailers is the fact that you might need to be home depending on what you order to sign for it. If you have a regular 9-to-5 job, that might not be possible, but a new service may just make it possible to receive deliveries when you’re actually home. (more…)

Luna Delivery Service Will Deliver Packages At Night When You’re Actually Home original content from Ubergizmo.

There may be a few less places to find an Amazon delivery locker after Staples and Radio Shack announced they were removing them from their stores, but Google’s competing offering is now getting a boost with its biggest expansion to date. The company announced today that it’s bringing its BufferBox lockers to San Francisco, marking the first expansion of the delivery service into the US since Google acquired the Canadian company late last year. Much like Amazon’s lockers, the BufferBox service simply lets you direct deliveries to a locker instead of your own address if you don’t expect to be at home — a service that remains completely free for the time being. This latest expansion also brings integration with Google’s recently announced Shopping Express service and mobile apps, which can now be used to direct same-day deliveries to a BufferBox locker. Those in SF can find a full list of locker locations at the source link below.

Filed under: Misc, Google

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Via: TechCrunch

Source: Google Commerce, BufferBox

Love to eBay, but not a fan of waiting? Then Devin Wenig — the auction site’s president — has some good news for you today. At a London press conference, he’s just announced the firm is launching “click and connect,” a service that (as you might have guessed) lets you purchase from large high-street retailers, and pick your item up in-store in the UK. For those merchants that don’t have a physical presence, a collaboration with British store Argos will mean they can deliver items through the chain’s infrastructure, offering another delivery channel. Initially Wenig advises that 150 Argos stores will have an “eBay collection point” with more locations likely to follow. There’s no word so far on costs to the seller (or buyer), but when you simply just gotta have it…

Update: Oh, and just like that, if collect in store wasn’t convenient enough, Wenig has just announced that eBay now, its one hour delivery service will be coming to Europe, starting in London early next year.

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Don’t let the name fool you, Mytaxi wants to drop off more than just people. The app-based service that began as a German take on Uber has now started using its fleet of drivers to offer one-hour courier deliveries in its home country. The Next Web reports that, once this initial trial is over at the end of the year, the 60-minute service could be expanded to cover US cities including Washington, D.C. (where Mytaxi already operates cabs), Denver, Miami and Seattle, at prices similar to existing shipping options. There’s a touch of irony in waiting around for the ambiguous domestic start date but, in the meantime, Google and eBay have you covered.

Filed under: Transportation, Mobile

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Source: The Next Web