Food delivery from drone! Tech startup conducts trial of delivery of frozen items in Gurugram

Drone delivery platform Skye Air Mobility on Monday said it has partnered with Curefoods to deliver frozen food to cloud kitchens in temperature-controlled boxes, using drones.

The week-long BVLOS (Beyond Visual Line of Sight) trials under the collaboration have already commenced from July 25 from Curefoods warehouse in Jhund Sarai in Gurugram to its kitchen outlet at Golf Course Road (Gurugram), Skye Air Mobility said.

The trials witnessed up to six flights per day, each carrying a payload of 5kg in temperature-controlled boxes that maintained a negative 20-degree temperature to keep the frozen food fresh, it said.

Skye Air has been using its flagship unmanned aerial vehicle Skye Ship One to facilitate real-time deliveries ensuring optimal flight safety and throughout temperature monitoring.

The drone travelled an aerial distance of 20 kilometres in less than 30 minutes, according to the company.

"This collaboration is a first-of-its-kind initiative in the direction of utilising cutting-edge technology to deliver food. Curefoods has taken an innovative approach towards improving logistics and further serving the demand of consumers," said Ankit Kumar, CEO, Skye Air Mobility.

With the ongoing trials, Skye Air anticipates gathering more data on route, flight, cost-economic viability in order to develop models for commercial flights to begin in the next few months, he added.

With the immense technological advancements, in the food-tech space drone delivery is going to change the game in the future. With drone delivery being initiated globally, this association with Skye Air Mobility is a pilot experiment to explore drone delivery as a viable food delivery option, said Ankit Nagori, founder of Curefoods.

"Starting with B2B pilot kitchen deliveries which ensure a larger quantity at a lesser cost, we will be looking at B2C food deliveries soon in the future," he said.