AlShrouq Express readies drone delivery trials as Saudi tests the economics of automated delivery

AlShrouq Express is in the final development stages of a drone delivery service, with trials “planned in the coming months,” the company’s chief marketing officer, Malak Jarrar, tells EnterpriseAM. The Saudi last-mile operator is also advancing autonomous-vehicle work it first piloted with King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST) and National Defense University (NDU) several years ago, placing it among a widening set of players testing where the Kingdom’s delivery economics go next.

The commercial case turns on cost structure, Jarrar says. Conventional delivery is mostly variable cost — labor, fuel, vehicle operation and utilization, she said — while autonomous and drone delivery move more of that cost to fixed technology and hardware, making the question how many deliveries that fixed cost can be spread across. She declined to give a cost-per-delivery figure, calling it “premature” before the new trials conclude.

The scope: AlShrouq puts its network at more than 55 cities and over 50k deliveries a day for upward of 4k clients. Its earlier autonomous pilot reached more than 60 deliveries per vehicle a day “in the right environment,” Jarrar says.

Regulation sets the pace: The General Authority of Civil Aviation (GACA) this year cleared its first drone medicine-delivery permit, during Hajj — a narrow medical clearance — as Riyadh saw its first autonomous food-delivery service and Aramex trailed drone and robotics across the region. Jarrar said AlShrouq is “following the development of the regulatory frameworks closely” and designing its systems to deploy “subject to the required approvals,” preparing ahead of any opening rather than waiting for one.