This study focuses on the development of a Last-Mile delivery service using unmanned vehicles to deliver goods directly to the end consumer utilizing drones to perform autonomous delivery missions and an image-based precision landing algorithm for handoff to a robot in an intermediate facility. As the logistics market continues to grow rapidly, parcel volumes increase exponentially each year. However, due to low delivery fees, the workload of delivery personnel is increasing, resulting in a decrease in the quality of delivery services. To address this issue, the research team conducted a study on a Last-Mile delivery service using unmanned vehicles and conducted research on the necessary technologies for drone-based goods transportation in this paper. The flight scenario begins with the drone carrying the goods from a pickup location to the rooftop of a building where the final delivery destination is located. There is a handoff facility on the rooftop of the building, and a marker on the roof must be accurately landed upon. The mission is complete once the goods are delivered and the drone returns to its original location. The research team developed a mission planning algorithm to perform the above scenario automatically and constructed an algorithm to recognize the marker through a camera sensor and achieve a precision landing. The performance of the developed system has been verified through multiple trial operations within ETRI.

Recently, unmanned logistics delivery systems, such as UAV (Unmanned Aerial Vehicle, written as drone below) and autonomous robot delivery systems, have been implemented in many countries due to the rapid development of autonomous driving technology. The development of these new types of advanced unmanned logistics delivery systems is essential not only to become a leading logistics company but also to secure national competitiveness. In this paper, the application of the unmanned logistics delivery system was investigated in terms of market trends, overall technology level of last mile delivery drone and autonomous delivery robot. The direction of response to changes in the last mile delivery service market was checked through a comparison of the technological level between domestic companies that produce last mile devices and advanced foreign companies. As a result of this technology level analysis, the difference between domestic companies and advanced companies was shown using tables and figures to show their relative levels. The results of this analysis reflect the opinions of experts in the field of last-mile delivery technology. In addition, the technology level of unmanned logistics delivery systems for each country was analyzed based on the number of related technology patents. Lastly, insights for the technology level analysis of unmanned last mile delivery systems were proposed as a conclusion.