China's second-biggest e-commerce company after Alibaba, sent robots to deliver items for the first time yesterday (June 18), on the last day of a two-week-long shopping bonanza that recorded sales of around $17.6 billion, according to a spokesman with the company. It's the first time that the company has used delivery robots in the field. JD tested its first delivery robot in November, when the research and manufacturing cost of a single robot was almost the price of an Audi Q7 series car, around 600,000 yuan ($88,125) (link in Chinese), JD's driverless program engineer Zhang Chao told CCTV. Robots can reduce the delivery cost from 7 yuan ($1) per human delivery to 1.5 yuan ($0.2) per robot delivery, said Zhang.

China's second-biggest e-commerce company after Alibaba, sent robots to deliver items for the first time yesterday (June 18), on the last day of a two-week-long shopping bonanza that recorded sales of around $17.6 billion, according to a spokesman with the company. Designed by JD, the white, four-wheeled droid can carry five packages at once and travel 20 km (12.4 miles) if fully charged. It can climb up a 25-degree incline (link in Chinese), and find the shortest route from warehouse to destination. Once it reaches its destination, the robot sends a text message to notify the recipient of the delivery. Users can accept the delivery through face-recognition technology or by using a code, according to China's state broadcaster CCTV.

Some 60 people from the police and Japan Coast Guard participated in the exercise at the Ikata nuclear power plant, which simulated a drone launched from a boat planting a makeshift explosive device on the premises of reactor 3. Officials of Shikoku Electric Power Co., which runs the plant, and members of the bomb disposal unit in the Ehime Prefectural Police also took part. "We took into account the serious situation regarding terrorism in conducting this drill, and I think it is important to prepare for the unpredictable," said Hideto Murase, the local security chief of the Ehime Prefectural Police. Reactor 3 was restarted last August after clearing safety requirements introduced after the March 2011 Fukushima nuclear crisis. The reactor runs on plutonium-uranium mixed oxide fuel, or MOX, which contains plutonium extracted by reprocessing spent fuel. Shikoku Electric plans to finish building by March 2020 a facility that is capable of withstanding major terror attacks, such as those involving intentional aircraft crashes, and preventing the release of radioactive materials.

A convenience store with a modern twist has launched in China. Moby Mart is an unmanned self-driving store which runs on solar power and is able to drive to your area at the touch of a button. Customers scan the goods themselves to purchase their shopping all without meeting a single person. Moby Mart is open to the public 24 hours a day and can automatically restock goods. New technology also allows users of the app to call a Moby to their area in order to buy items. While there are also plans to have drones installed on the top of shops to deliver goods to customers.

The Pentagon may soon unleash an army of robotic drones that are fast and smart enough to fly alongside fighter planes. Two classes of drone designed to act as airborne wingmen in aerial missions have been unveiled by a Pentagon-backed startup in the Silicon Valley. Though still in the testing phase, the drones could one day be used to protect human life by absorbing the first wave of an aerial attack. Pictured is an artistic impression of what the XQ-222 Valkyrie will look like. The Pentagon may soon unleash an army of robotic drones that are fast and smart enough to fly alongside fighter planes.

Tallinn, Estonia - Things are bad on the small island nation of Berylia after a diplomatic row with Crimsonia, its bigger neighbour and rival. There are street protests by the Crimsonian minority in Berylia, which then suffers a wave of cyber-attacks that make it lose control of its drones and its only international airbase. Crimsonia is blamed for the cyberoffensive even though there's no hard proof. Crippled by the attacks, Berylia, a new member of the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO), weighs its options. One of them is to invoke Article 5 and take the military alliance to war against Crimsonia.

Yemen-based AQAP has exploited a more than two-year-old civil war between the Iran-aligned Houthis and President Abd Rabbu Mansour Hadi's Saudi-backed government to enhance its influence in the impoverished country.

Drones are becoming a ubiquitous technology with their increasing capabilities. Amazon is using them to deliver packages, Japanese innovators have created pollinator drones, and drones are even being used as backup dancers for pop stars. There are even drones emerging that could help to save lives. One such drone is being developed by Flypulse, a Swedish startup working on an autonomous drone that can bring life-saving equipment to the scene of a medical emergency. Its has the ability to deliver Automated External Defibrillators (AED) at an incredible speed -- four times faster than an ambulance.

It's easy to get lost in the great pantheon of consumer drones. Even just looking at industry leader DJI's options, there are enough choices to set your head spinning faster than a quadcopter blade. Coming in at a cool $1,800, this marks the top end of what could be considered DJI's consumer line, with the next level up being the $3,000 pro-level Inspire 2. Nice controller with a bright screen comes bundled. Some of the autonomous flight modes are still lacking. The tablet controller isn't as powerful as your phone, and the app experience while streaming video is glitchier too.

Starship Technologies' delivery bots have been dropping off lunches in Europe and the US with increasing regularity, and governments are slowly warming to the idea. State legislatures in Virginia and Idaho recently granted official permission for small delivery robots to operate on sidewalks, and now Estonia(!) has offered its approval as well. The measure passed 86 to 0 in the country's parliament yesterday, making Estonia the first country in the EU to officially bless these adorable, food-slinging robots. There are, obviously, a few stipulations. The robots in question can't be taller than one meter, longer than 1.2 meters, or weigh more than 50 kilograms.