China's JD.com Looks to Silicon Valley Center for Innovation

Self-driving delivery vehicles that are polite to pedestrians? JD.com, the largest challenger to Alibaba's e-commerce empire in China, is investing in technology to speed up warehouse operations and delivery to shoppers who want service quickly. In China, it's testing drone delivery, has opened an automated warehouse that's improved on manual sorting, and it's testing deliveries using unmanned vehicles at universities in Beijing. It also uses these self-driving vehicles that look like rolling ice cream carts to move goods inside its warehouses. Though it does not sell in the United States, the Beijing-based online retailer is also leaning on its 2-year-old research and development lab in Silicon Valley to recruit top talent and get access to tech startups.