Noon has announced it has partnered with Chinese technology company Neolix to trial driverless delivery vehicles.
Mohamed Alabbar, noon.com’s founder signed a memorandum of understand (MoU) with Neolix Huitong (Beijing) Technology, to introduce autonomous delivery vehicles into the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia.
This will be the first time such technology has been used in the region and will open a new spectrum of opportunity to introduce powerful Chinese technology to the world.
“Introducing new technology to the region that will improve the e-commerce experience for customers is something we’re incredibly excited about. noon is very proud to bring driverless delivery vans to streets in our cities,” said Alabbar. “We look forward to bringing many such innovations over the next few months. We are a hungry, talented and ambitious nation. I hope it will inspire our tech-driven youth to dream big and to achieve those dreams because everything is possible here.”
Under the agreement, over the next few weeks, noon.com will trial autonomous vehicles to complete its last-mile delivery in key areas of Abu Dhabi and Dubai.
The driverless vehicles will be built by Neoflix who have deep knowledge and experience with the productization of autonomous technology. The driverless vans are being especially customized to suit the region’s weather conditions, and are being seamlessly integrated with noon’s logistics platform.
Having already created a hyper-efficient homegrown logistics and supply chain setup in the KSA, the UAE and Egypt, noon.com is now looking to make the last mile of deliveries even smoother to give customers in the region a higher quality experience. As well as being reliable and speedy, driverless vehicle technology can remove up to 90 percent of the cost associated with the last mile of delivery.
The partnership between Neolix and noon furthers noon’s commitment to bring the best technology and solutions to serve our region’s ecommerce customers.
Primarily a digital e-commerce platform utilizing homegrown technology capabilities, noon has rapidly built deep native capabilities in its marketplace, fulfillment, logistics and payments platforms. noon promises to bring customers in the region more choice, affordability and convenience across a wide range of products including electronics, fashion, beauty, baby, home and kitchen, as well as free, fast delivery and free returns.
