Alibaba is experimenting with a drone delivery service as the Chinese ecommerce group seeks ever faster ways to put its goods in eager consumers’ hands.阿里巴巴(Alibaba)正在测试无人机车主服务,这家中国电子商务集团谋求以更为较慢的方式,将商品送往迫切的消费者手中。The service — using propeller-driven drones in three major Chinese cities — appears more a publicity stunt than a serious business model, but raises the question of whether using drones for short-hop logistics is viable on the mainland, where airspace is tightly controlled.这项在中国三大城市测试的、用于螺旋桨驱动无人机车主的服务,或许更加看起来一个宣传噱头,而不是一种月的商业模式,但它明确提出了一个问题:在中国大陆用于无人机展开短途车主否不切实际?中国不存在严苛的航空管制。
Alibaba “aren’t hinting that drone-delivery service is ripe for commercialisation in [mainland China]”, the company said.阿里巴巴回应,该公司并不是在似乎无人机车主服务(在中国大陆)的商业化时机早已成熟期。It said the quadcopter drones were deployed in a “one-off test”, to last three days, launched in areas of Beijing, Shanghai, and Guangzhou to whisk boxes of ginger tea to customers.阿里巴巴称之为,将在北京、上海、广州三地进行为期三天的“重复使用测试”,测试中将用于四轴飞行器把盒装姜茶慢拿着客户。The drones would not be flown right to customers’ doors, but to central logistics sites where the “last-mile” delivery will be handled by human couriers, said Alibaba, whose online marketplaces account for about 75-80 per cent of the ecommerce in China.该公司回应,这些无人机会必要飞到客户门前,而是不会飞回物流站点,“最后一公里”的车主将由租车员负责管理。
阿里巴巴的在线集市占有了中国电商市场大约75%到80%的份额。The drones were deployed by logistics company YTO Express, a partner of Alibaba.阿里巴巴的合作伙伴、物流公司圆通速递(YTO Express)继续执行了这次无人机车主服务。Companies the world over have begun to experiment with unmanned aerial vehicles as part of efforts to more easily and quickly reach more remote delivery addresses.全球各地的企业已开始测试无人机车主,借此更加快捷地将货物送往较偏僻的车主地址。
But regulations in China are so onerous that few believe airspace will be freed up any time soon to widespread use of whirring and buzzing quadcopter drones.但中国的法规十分繁复,以至于没什么人坚信其领空旋即之后就能对外开放给嗡嗡作响的四轴飞行器普遍用于。Last June, US video artist Trey Ratcliff was detained and had his GoPro camera-equipped drone confiscated by police after he flew it over the Forbidden City in Beijing without permission.去年6月,美国影像艺术家特里拉特克利夫(Trey Ratcliff)在未经许可的情况下,操纵装有GoPro摄像头的无人机从北京故宫海面盘旋。拉特克利夫随后被被捕,无人机也被警方充公。
“Deciding to fly a drone over China is kind of like Luke Skywalker deciding to ride his landspeeder on the Death Star,” he wrote in a blog post about the incident. “Note to self: don’t mess with these guys.”拉特克利夫在一篇博客中对此事叙述道:“要求操纵无人机盘旋中国海面,类似于卢克天行者(Luke Skywalker)要求在死星(Death Star)上驾驶员他的陆上飞艇(landspeeder)。自我警告:别碰这些家伙。”In 2013, a Shanghai bakery scrapped plans to deliver cakes within 30 minutes, using drone couriers, blaming airspace regulations.2013年,上海一家面包店退出了用无人机在30分钟内将糕点送往顾客手中的计划,并将原因归入航空管制。
Even in the relatively liberal US, Amazon has had to navigate regulatory issues as it tries to set up drone delivery services. The company, which has drone RD testing centres in both the US and the UK, said last year that it was creating Amazon Prime Air, which aims to use pilotless flying vehicles to deliver packages to millions of customers within half an hour of orders being placed.即使在管制比较严格的美国,亚马逊(Amazon)在尝试创建无人机车主服务时,也必需小心应付监管问题。亚马逊在美国和英国都有无人机测试中心。去年该公司回应,正在创立Amazon Prime Air服务,其目标是利用无人飞行器将包覆送往数百万顾客手中,顾客下单后最多等半小时包覆才可送往。
However, founder Jeff Bezos has said the service could be delayed by red tape as US authorities have yet to approve proposals for commercial drone use. Tech commentators have dismissed the project as a marketing gimmick.然而,亚马逊创始人杰夫贝索斯(Jeff Bezos)已回应,这项服务有可能因繁复的审核申请而延后发售,因为美国监管部门仍未批准后用于商业无人机的方案。科技评论人士指出该计划是一个营销噱头、不用理会。Racing against Amazon to get drones into regular commercial use, Google has opted for test runs in Australia, as aviation authorities have yet to allow any more than limited use in the US.在让无人机转入正规化商用方面,谷歌(Google)于是以与亚马逊进行竞赛。
谷歌自由选择在澳大利亚展开测试,当地航空管理部门对无人机用于的容许远比美国严格。
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