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In 2020, our Kar-go self-driving delivery vehicle became the first vehicle, custom-built for autonomous delivery to be to be assessed by the DVSA and licensed to drive on the roads in the UK. AVs on the road typically operate with both a safety driver in the vehicle and/or a remote operations team based in a nearby building, who are able to send commands to vehicles or remotely take control if necessary.
As one of the first organisations to have self-driving vehicles on the roads, we were also one of the first to trial remote-monitoring using a Command Hub in an office building. In doing so, we discovered a number of industry-wide challenges, which led us to invent and build a new mobile Command Hub vehicle, “Space-Bus” and the operating system for it, “Athena.” As we moved from a standard command hub to a mobile version our team carefully monitored the levels of connectivity with the vehicle. To understand if connectivity could successfully be maintained whilst picking up and delivering parcels in a typical residential area, we set up a delivery trial with a local shop.
The team at local boutique, Something Special, loaded the parcels onto Kar-go and Kar-go set off on its delivery route. The packages were delivered as a continuous delivery round with recipients being notified that the vehicle was approaching and coming out of the house to meet the vehicle.
The hatch of our specially-designed Kar-go autonomous delivery vehicle was then automatically released so recipients could take their parcels. The hatch then closed automatically and Kar-go drove on to the next address, repeating the process until it had completed its round.
The trial was advertised locally with customers of Something Special and other local residents applying to take part and to have the opportunity to be amongst the first to have a package delivered by our Kar-go vehicles. With trials taking place on the public roads on a busy Saturday morning, the deliveries were also observed by numerous members of the public and filmed by the BBC for BBC Click.