Two Companies Team Up To Start A Book-Delivery-By-Drone Business

Australian startup Flirtey is in the unmanned aerial vehicle business, and it's partnered with a company called Zookal to effectively create the Amazon.com of textbooks that delivers by way of drone instead of UPS.

Australian authorities were among the first in the world to deem commercial drone usage legal, so Flirtey got to work finding ways to apply the technology. By partnering with textbook company Zookal, Flirtey will use its drones to deliver Zookal customers' orders directly to them.

It previously cost Zookal an average $8.60 in shipping costs to fill an order. Now that drones will be handling delivery, however, that average shipping cost drops to an estimated $0.80 per order.

Here's how TechCrunch's Catherine Shu described it:

"Zookal will use Flirtey to send parcels for free and claims deliveries can be made in as little as two or three minutes, compared to two or three days for traditional shipping methods. Upon arrival at an outdoor delivery destination, Flirtey's drones hover and lower the parcel through a custom delivery mechanism that is attached to a retractable cord. Real-time GPS tracking of each drone's location will be available through the Flirtey app for smartphones."

Intrigued? Check out this video with the founders to learn more.