How many drones do you need to serve the Bay area?

1. clarification

Bay area - we are assuming nine counties (Alameda, Contra costa, marin, Napa, SFO, San mateo, Santa Carla, Solana and Sonoma. Can we also assume that the drone usage is to delivery food and grocery or should the scope be larger

Yes for both
2. Assumptions on Data

Population - 7M

Area - 7000 sq-mile

Average drone coverage per charge - 50 miles

Average delivery distance Drone will have to cover = 5 miles

Service is available from 8AM to 8PM 7 days a week and drones will not be charged during that time, it is charged before start of day and shut down if the charge is less than or equal to 10 miles availability

3. Type of users

a) Daily users ( people who depend on delivery service for food and Grocery)

b) infrequent users (population that uses once or twice a week)

c) occasional users (population that uses at rare instances once a month)

4. Main question

number of drones required to serve the bay area population to deliver food or grocery

5. Main equation

# of drones = Population that will use drone X # of deliveries X (average delivery distance X 2/ battery coverrage ) X # of trips drone can do per day

6.Calculations

Segment calculation

All users who could use the service - assumption 50%

All users = 7M*.50 =3.5M

daily users 20%= 3.5*.2 = 700K

infrequent users 30% = 3.5*.3 = 1.05M

 occasional users = 50% = 3.5*.5 = 1.75M

order per day = # of Daily user order + # of infrequent users per day + # of occasional users per day

# of daily users order/ day  = 700K X 1 = 700K

# of infrequent users order / day = 1.05M/ 7 = 150K

# of occasional users order / day = 3.5M/ day = 1.75M/7 = 250K

orders per  day = 700+150+250 = 1.1M orders

 drone required = avg distance to deliver X 2 / battery without charge + # of drone which will be retired for the day as not sufficient charge to deliver

Drone required /day = (1.1M  X ( (5x2)/50) + (1.1 X ((5X2)/50)X .20)

                                    = 220K + 44K = 264K