Pizza delivered by drone? It's been done for real in New Zealand

Look, we'll admit we had our doubts about the wonderfully convenient idea of drone pizza deliveries. But Domino's Pizza says it's done it for real this time.

The chain said it made its first commercial delivery in New Zealand to an actual, real human customer on Wednesday at 11:19 a.m. local time. And egads! The drone delivery was even approved by the country's civil aviation authority.

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The order was for a peri-peri chicken pizza and chicken and cranberry pizza (odd choice, but OK), and delivered to a customer in the suburb of Whangaparaoa, 25 kilometres (15 miles) north of Auckland.

Domino's have partnered with drone delivery startup Flirtey for the project. While the unmanned aerial vehicle was autonomously controlled using GPS navigation, a team of drone experts and a drone pilot oversaw the delivery.

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The pizza chain is pretty adamant to continue trialling the drone technology with customers this week, as they explore drone delivery "opportunities" in six other markets including Australia, Belgium, France, The Netherlands, Japan and Germany.

"We will be conducting more delivery flights to customers from the Whangaparaoa store this week, and will use the information we gather to expand drone flights to a larger DRU Drone by Flirtey delivery area next year," Domino's Group CEO Don Meij said in a statement.

For those worried about their jobs going to a bunch of robots, Domino's say the drone delivery service will create additional specialist roles.

"We expect the DRU Drone by Flirtey to be an essential addition to our delivery fleet. This will actually create jobs. As we expand, we will look to hire additional team members whose roles will be focused on drone order loading and fleet management," Meij said.

Not a completely pie in the sky idea, so it would seem.

(责任编辑：行业动态)