The epidemic has spurred unmanned vehicles.

　　Source of the header image: Haomo Zhixing

　　Between the manpower bottleneck and the huge demand, unmanned vehicles are playing an important role in the battle against the epidemic.

　　In April this year, more than 100 JD.com unmanned express vehicles were shipped to Shanghai. Meituan and Haomo Zhixing jointly launched more than 50 "magic bags" to shuttle through Fudan University, Ruijin Hospital and other areas, and Neolithic launched 150 unmanned vehicles. ; More than 10 "little magic camels" owned by Great Wall Motor's Mamozhixing have also become the regular army to supplement the transportation capacity.

　　Gu Weihao, CEO of Maomo, believes that in the context of the times, if unmanned delivery vehicles can exert their market value, this track can develop rapidly, and whether it can make everyone really less contact, this matter will become more and more. Significant.

　　However, returning to the business itself, in the long run, there are still many problems such as cost, scale, policies and regulations.

　　The core question of the development of the unmanned logistics vehicle track is "whether the business model is feasible". Gu Weihao believes that if the price of the unmanned logistics vehicle itself can be comparable to the price of people, or lower, such a business model will be feasible and this track will develop.

　　According to the research report of Chentao Capital, at present, the average cost of terminal distribution in my country's express delivery industry is about 1.2 yuan per piece; the average comprehensive cost of front-line employees of JD Logistics is close to 110,000 yuan per year. In contrast, some unmanned distribution companies can achieve a vehicle cost of about 200,000-250,000 yuan, and some companies have a complete vehicle cost of about 500,000 yuan.

　　In recent days, the Momo Little Magic Camel 2.0 was officially released, and for the first time, the price of the terminal logistics automatic distribution vehicle was dropped to 128,800 yuan. The product is expected to be launched on the market in May 2022.

　　How did the cost of unmanned logistics vehicles drop to 100,000?

　　According to the research report of Chentao Capital, the core elements affecting the comprehensive cost of unmanned distribution include vehicle software and hardware costs, usage/operation costs, and operational efficiency. Among them, in terms of vehicle cost, the three core components with the highest cost of unmanned delivery vehicles are: lidar, computing platform and wire-controlled chassis.

　　Lidar, computing platforms, etc. are common components in the autonomous driving industry. In recent years, with the advancement of technology, the trend of cost reduction is obvious.

　　At present, the price of domestic 16-line, 32-line, and 40-line lidar has dropped to 10,000-40,000. At the same time, due to the low driving speed, unmanned delivery vehicles have relatively low performance requirements for sensors and computing platforms.

　　Gu Weihao said that the secret of the "Little Magic Camel" being able to drop the price to 100,000 is that "let the unmanned logistics vehicle gradually develop in the direction of the vehicle regulations, and try to use the same as the passenger car. Sensors, calculators".

　　In the downstream of the unmanned distribution industry chain, the demand for B-side scenarios is increasing, including e-commerce companies represented by JD.com, Ali, and Meituan, and supermarket retail represented by Yonghui Supermarket, Wumart Supermarket, and Dingdang Kuaiyao. Enterprises, express/distribution service providers such as SF Express, Four Links and One Da, etc. Unmanned logistics vehicles can establish cooperation with more customers and increase product scale.

　　Source: Chentao Capital

　　So far, SF Express and Wumart have reached cooperation with Maomo. In order to meet the demand for orders, the end-logistics automatic distribution vehicle factory of Haomo Zhixing in Baoding has been upgraded to achieve the annual production capacity target of 10,000 end-logistics automatic distribution vehicles.

　　However, the current regulations and policies for unmanned delivery vehicles are still unclear.

　　In October 2021, a private car in Shunyi, Beijing had a traffic accident with a Meituan unmanned delivery vehicle. After investigating the scene, the traffic police determined that the Meituan unmanned delivery vehicle was fully responsible and issued a ticket. This is also the first domestic public report to issue a fine for an unmanned delivery vehicle. At the same time, it has triggered a discussion on the safety and responsibility of unmanned vehicles on the road in the industry.

　　Yu Lingyun, a professor at Tsinghua University Law School, believes: "Under the current Road Traffic Law, L2 and L3 self-driving vehicles equipped with safety officers can solve legal problems, but if there are no safety officers, there will be legal gaps."

　　At the same time, Professor Yu Lingyun also said that there is also controversy over whether an unmanned vehicle is a motor vehicle or a non-motor vehicle. Although some companies define unmanned delivery vehicles as non-motor vehicles, in judicial practice, the actual identification is usually the basis, without reference to whether they are licensed or not, and as long as they exceed the standard, they will be identified as motor vehicles.

　　"The terminal logistics automatic distribution scene is still on the eve of the market outbreak, and everyone is working hard to polish their own technologies and closed-loop business models." Zhang Kai, chairman of Haomo Zhixing, believes that in 2022, the terminal logistics automation currently received from Haomo Judging from the number of orders for delivery vehicles, some leading customers have begun to deploy large-scale scenarios.

　　Chentao Capital said that since 2020, the top players of unmanned distribution at the end have gradually removed security guards and entered normal operation, and have generated real business income in actual operation. In the next three years, the cost of unmanned delivery vehicles will gradually drop to less than 100,000 yuan.

　　Source: Chentao Capital