Amazon's role as a disrupter of supply chain and logistics practices and driver of change in the sector has taken on an even more futurist dimension with US media reports asserting that the e-commerce giant was recently granted a patent for what can best be described as 'flying' warehouses which would serve as hubs for drone delivery activity on a large scale.

While the company has not confirmed the reports, in a filing to the US authorities in April last year, viewed by Lloyd's Loading List, it outlined plans for 'airborne fulfillment centers' (AFCs) and the use of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) to deliver items from the AFCs to users.

The filing stated: “For example, the AFC may be an airship that remains at a high altitude (for example, 45,000 feet) and UAVs with ordered items may be deployed from the AFC to deliver ordered items to user designated delivery locations.

“As the UAVs descend, they can navigate horizontally toward a user specified delivery location using little to no power, other than to stabilize the UAV and/or guide the direction of descent. Shuttles (smaller airships) may be used to replenish the AFC with inventory, UAVs, supplies, fuel, etc. Likewise, the shuttles may be utilized to transport workers to and from the AFC.”

The filing continued: “An AFC may navigate to an area based on various positioning factors. For example, a temporal event (e.g., a football game) may be expected to produce a demand for certain types of items (for example, sporting paraphernalia, food products, etc.).

“In advance of the event, the items may be delivered to the AFC in a quantity sufficient to satisfy the expected demand and the AFC may navigate to a position such that UAVs deployed from the AFC can safely navigate to the location of the event and deliver the items, thereby satisfying the demand.

“In some implementations, the AFC may navigate to a lower altitude and provide advertising for the temporal event or for other occasions (e.g., product announcements, product releases, sales).”

Another benefit of the AFC is that items could be delivered within minutes of an order being placed, Amazon underlined.

“For example, a user may place an order for delivery of item A, which is maintained in the inventory of an AFC within a defined distance from the user. Item A may be picked from inventory, engaged by a UAV and the UAV may be deployed from the AFC.

“The picking of item A through deployment may be completed within minutes of the user's order. In some implementations, some UAVs may be pre-engaged with inventory items so that when an order for such an item is received, a UAV with the engaged inventory can be immediately deployed, further reducing the delivery time.

“Deployed UAVs may quickly descend toward a user specified delivery location (e.g., the location of the user) and deliver the item. This speed of delivery provides near instant gratification to users for item purchases and greatly increases the breadth of items that can be delivered.

“For example, perishable items or even prepared meals can be delivered in a timely fashion to a user. In general, any item that can be carried by a UAV may be delivered using the implementations discussed herein,” the filing added.

An inventory management system could be configured to communicate (for example, wirelessly) with the AFC, shuttle(s), and/or UAVs, it noted.

In a separate development, Amazon was granted a new patent at the end of last month to protect its drones from possible threats and attackers.

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