(Bloomberg) – Mercedes-Benz is looking at mounting automated flying drones onto a new line of electric vans as part of a 500 million-euro ($562 million) investment aimed at speeding delivery times for online orders.

The small pilotless aircraft would be part of a suite of on-board systems, including digital sorting equipment, that could cut both costs and delivery times in half for the final portion of a package's journey, the carmaker said Wednesday at a presentation in Stuttgart, Germany. The two drones can each fly items weighing as much as 2 kilograms (4.4 pounds) as far as 10 kilometers (6 miles), enabling service to difficult-to-reach to places.

Speed product transport

The concept is among the Daimler AG unit's efforts to help corporate customers speed product transport as volumes rise because of the boom in electronic commerce. Deutsche Post AG's DHL division and United Parcel Service Inc. are also looking at how to ensure items are delivered on the first attempt even when the consumer isn't home. Online retailers such as Amazon.com Inc. are experimenting with handling deliveries themselves.

"The business in our sector is changing dramatically, so we're looking far beyond our core product and getting into new markets," Volker Mornhinweg, who heads Mercedes's vans business, said in a statement. "We want to make vans an intelligent, connected data center on wheels."