China has always been an interesting country when it comes to technological developments. Its latest venture revolves around robotics and ways to improve parcel delivery. Two new courier robots were recently unveiled at Renmin University of China, and the initial response seems pretty positive.
Parcel Delivery Robots Have a Bright Future
China has many problems in need of solving soon. One of those problems involves keeping up with the demand for parcel delivery services. Human workers cannot keep up with the growing demand to have parcels delivered throughout the day. This trend may not necessarily be common in the Western world, although the United States may be a different case. One thing’s for sure: typical Chinese deliverymen need all the help they can get.
Right now, these workers are being helped by a new fleet of robots which can deliver parcels with ease. At Beijing’s Renmin University of China, two new robots are currently zipping around campus. They are incredibly brightly colored, which makes them pretty easy to spot. While they may not necessarily become the robot postmen of the future, the concept certainly has a lot of merit in the long run. After all, the initial response seems to be rather positive.
These new delivery robots are controlled by a centralized command center sitting 25 miles away. Their range is pretty large and unlike anything we have seen so far. More importantly, they are controlled by JD.com, which is one of China’s largest e-commerce players these days. Whether or not other companies will enter this space in the future remains to be determined. There are a lot of opportunities to explore in this regard, to say the least.
No one can deny things are changing at an accelerated pace in China. The country’s vast delivery industry is in an interesting state right now, considering demand has vastly outweighed the available infrastructure in place today. With the help of courier robots, things are certainly picking up steam. After all, parcel volumes are growing by around 50% every year, yet the number of available staffers continues to decline. Something has to change, and it seems using robotics is the only possible way to go.
It is also worth mentioning various top delivery firms in China are experimenting with robots as well as automated sorting lines. Considering that China’s Singles Day is almost upon us, the number of packages waiting to be processed will increase beyond belief. It is expected there will be 1.5 billion parcels to be shipped in the country over the next few weeks.
Another key point is that wages in China are going up, whereas the cost of technology is going down. There is a tipping point at which it makes a lot more sense for companies to use this sort of technology over human workers. It is not necessarily something most people will be happy with, what with robots taking our jobs and all. At the same time, robots will not displace all human workers anytime soon. There will be a few interesting years ahead in this regard; that much no one can deny.
