DAILY INNOVATION BRIEF by Maryanne Kane, Journalist

 DAILY INNOVATION BRIEF

                                                                      

         By Journalists Edward Kane & Maryanne Kane

WORLD'S FASTEST PERSONAL HOVERCRAFT

                                                             Source:  Von Mercier

• Maryland-based Von Mercier has developed a personal hovercraft called Arosa that is the world's fastest, electric amphibious vehicle
• Top speed is 50 mph and cruising speed is 20 mph
• With an electric powertrain, 3 electric motors & fan design, it is also the world's quietest hovercraft
• Arosa rides on a cushion of air 6 inches above water, land, grass, snow, sand or gravel 
• It can brake, accelerate & travel laterally by 360 degrees
• Priced at $200,000, it can carry a driver and 2 passengers
• Arosa looks like a glamorous sportscar (although it isn't street legal) and is in production for customer deliveries in July
• Choice of 2 batteries:  18 kWh with a range of 40 miles or 90 minutes of cruising time or 36 kWh with 80-mile range or 3 hours of cruising time.

ROBOTS DO PASSENGER CHECK-INS AT DUBAI AIRPORT

                                        Source:  Emirates Airlines

• At busy Dubai airport, Emirates Airlines is deploying many multilingual robots to provide passenger check-ins and ease long lines
• More than 200 check-in robots named Sara are being put into service
• Enabled by AI, the robots can perform the entire check-in process, including doing facial recognition by scanning passports and issuing boarding passes
• Emirates is the first global airline to deploy portable check-in robotics
• The airlines says it will expand the robots' suite of services to include booking hotels for passengers and much more
• In addition to the new robotic check-in team, Emirates Airlines has new biometric pathways using facial and iris recognition for check-in and boarding flights.

GOOGLE'S ALPHABET DRONE NETWORK WING

                                                                        Source:  Wing

• The prestigious DNA on the new drone delivery network is clear:  no less than Google's parent company Alphabet & its history of innovation moonshots, with Wing as its drone network startup
• Wing calls its drone delivery network a "rideshare service"
• The Wing business model is uniquely fascinating

• Wing calls it an "efficient data network rather than a traditional transportation system"
• It's configured like this: 

1. Autoloader hardware is installed at the retailer's curbside pickup area
2. Retailer walks product out & attaches it to Wing device
3. System determines most efficient path for pickup & delivery
4. Works like Uber or Lyft by matching drone and product based on proximity to upcoming drop-off

• Wing's Delivery Network can pick up, drop-off, travel & charge with multiple charging spots to meet peaks in demand across cities
• Wing is rolling its services over the next year
• Wing promises to handle millions of deliveries for millions of people at a much less expensive cost than ground transport by mid-2024.

For more news stories like this, Latest Innovations For Tomorrow