Wing to test Nvidia's new Jetson chip for delivery drones

Wing, the drone delivery unit owned by Alphabet, said it will assess a new onboard computer from Nvidia for potential use in its delivery aircraft. Nvidia unveiled the chip, called the Jetson Orin Nano 2, this week and named Wing as a company that will test the hardware for real-time perception and decision-making in beyond visual line of sight drone operations.

According to Nvidia, the new module delivers 78 trillion operations per second of AI processing, with 8GB of memory and an eight-core Arm processor. The company says it offers roughly twice the inference performance of the earlier Jetson Orin Nano Super chip while using about 40% less power for equivalent workloads.

Wing's head of perception, Dinuka Abeywardena, said drone delivery relies on AI systems capable of interpreting the environment quickly and reliably. The company is looking at whether the new chip could make its drones more responsive and energy efficient, though neither firm gave a timeline for completing the evaluation or said when the hardware might be deployed operationally.

More onboard processing power could let Wing's drones analyze sensor data faster and run more sophisticated obstacle-detection software. Its aircraft already scan delivery sites for obstructions and can adjust position before lowering a package.

Lower power draw from the new computer could also free up energy for other onboard systems, though neither company said the chip would extend flight range or endurance.

Wing currently flies its delivery fleet using Nvidia's existing Jetson Orin Nano Super chip and associated software. Nvidia said the newer Jetson Orin Nano 2 module and its development kit are expected to reach the market during the first half of 2027.