DoorDash showed its own delivery drone and named Chipotle and Popeyes for a Northern California pilot

DoorDash unveiled the aircraft on September 30, two months after announcing its Part 135 air carrier certificate and the DoorDash Air program. The company says pilot deliveries will begin in Northern California. Chipotle Mexican Grill, Popeyes Louisiana Kitchen, and the independent restaurant Momo N Curry are among the first partners.

The aircraft has six slow-spinning propellers at the ends of its arms. DoorDash says its cruising noise at delivery height is roughly that of a passing car. It delivers by winch and has added failsafe systems to lower the aircraft to the ground in rare events. DoorDash says it sized the design from its own order data, and that about 80 percent of today's typical restaurant orders are light and small enough to carry. In its initial tests, it says, restaurant-to-door times averaged under five minutes. Both figures are company estimates from limited samples.