The world’s first crewless, automated cargo ship will launch in 2018, reports the Wall Street Journal, and is expected to be fully autonomous by 2020.
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WHY IT MATTERS: Digital Transformation
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Farid Mheir
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ARK expects autonomous trucks to reduce the cost of trucking from 12 cents per ton-mile to 3 cents during the next five to ten years.
Farid Mheir's insight:
WHY IT MATTERS: if you do not include self-driving trucks and electrification into your strategic digital plan for distribution then you will have competitors that are 4x cheaper than you are competing for your clients in the coming years. Start planning what it means to your people, processes, and internal technologies. Put together prototypes and proof-of-concepts with startups in the area today. This is what digital transformation will mean in the 2020s: we are way past having a nice a website and eCommerce! 
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Selected quotes include:
Farid Mheir's insight:
Jeff Bezos said during Code conference that Amazon will not get into the delivery business to replace partners - but will supplement it heavily.
I wrote before that amazon will get into the grocery food delivery business because it is the only way they can reduce their delivery costs - costs they have to give to fedex, purolator, USPS and others. So basically they will go into grocery business to break even and get free local delivery in certain key market areas.
Recently, Walmart has begun pilot tests to deliver groceries using UBER (http://www.reuters.com/article/us-wal-mart-groceries-idUSKCN0YP0H6?il=0). This sounds like a great idea, focussing on each other's strength (walmart = products & logistics, uber = delivery) with no investment to access huge volume. This option may not be as efficient as the Amazon model however but be a great solution in periods of high volume.
To see what I wrote about this, see http://www.scoop.it/t/digital-transformation-of-businesses?q=amazon+fresh
WHY THIS IS IMPORTANT Delivery remains the biggest cost for online retailers. Between 10% to 20% of retailer costs are sunk into delivery. This remains a huge hurdle for both retailers and consumers compared to physical stores. I expect online retailer to be more and more creative on the delivery front to reduce costs and deliver faster.
Established eCommerce retailers should look for opportunities to improve delivery and newbies to never underestimate delivery as it is the CORE to make or break their online retail business. Mark my words...
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Unexpected convergent consequences…this is what happens when eight different exponential technologies all explode onto the scene at once. This post (sixth in a series of seven) is a look at robotics. Be sure to... read more
Farid Mheir's insight:
Great list of breakthrough and predictions regarding robotics. I expect robotics to have a huge impact on businesses beyond manufacturing, in areas such as distribution, logistics, and tasks that used to require humans.
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Nine days, 15 states, and 3,400 miles after leaving San Francisco, Delphi's autonomous car arrived in New York City.
Farid Mheir's insight:
11 years ago the DARPA challenge for an autonomous car to drive across 150 miles in the desert resulted in no car being able to cross the finish line. Today, cars can drive 99% of the way across North America in autonomous mode, and Google self-driving cars has many million miles of driving experience behind its autonomous wheel. Where will we be 10 years from now (hey, I'll only be 60 then!)? As Elon Musk recently said, in 20 years owning a car will be like owning a horse - http://bit.ly/1SCn0PF. WHY THIS IS IMPORTANT As I wrote about previously (http://bit.ly/1SCna9O), self-driving cars and other autonomous driving will be a revolution for commercial deliveries (autonomous semi-trailer truck now testing in Nevada http://bit.ly/1SCocm2) and other mundane tasks like commuting to work. The economies this may bring to forward thinking companies are enormous.
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Amazon has 173 logistics facilities worldwide, so it might build its own logistical network — which should terrify traditional vendors like UPS and FedEx.
Farid Mheir's insight:
Amazon may replace UPS and FedEx with its own delivery service. I wrote about this in the past when I assumed that Amazon is developing grocery delivery as a volume business to put trucks on the road and cut distributions costs drastically. In that light Amazon is not looking at grocery as a profit center - all it needs is an operation that breaks even because when it does, all other deliveries will basically be free of charge. And this would mean Amazon will never open stores.
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Curated by Farid Mheir
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WHY IT MATTERS: we think of autonomous vehicles as self-driving cars. But we are more likely to see business and professional applications such as this self-driving cargo ship appear first.