Recently, Academician Chen Xiaoqi, Dean of the Shien-Ming Wu School of Intelligent Engineering, was interviewed by China Central Television (CCTV) on how artificial intelligence has reshaped the entire e-commerce value chain during this year’s “618” shopping festival, with a special focus on smart warehousing and unmanned delivery. The interview has been featured across multiple CCTV platforms, including its news app, China National Radio’s News Now, and Global Financial Update, drawing wide attention.

The report highlights that despite the continued surge in order volumes during this year’s 618 sales, the logistics network has performed with remarkable stability and efficiency. Key innovations include AI-generated promotional materials at scale, around‑the‑clock unmanned delivery vehicles operating on city streets, “goods‑to‑person” systems in smart warehouses that have tripled productivity, and low‑altitude drones that have opened up new aerial delivery channels, significantly cutting last‑mile delivery times. Together, these forces are fundamentally transforming the logistics landscape.

In his interview, Academician Chen offered an in‑depth perspective on these technological shifts. He noted that AI has matured considerably in the online side of e‑commerce, especially in advertising and promotion. Leveraging vast datasets, AI now uses deep learning and user profiling to accurately identify consumer intent and hidden needs, enabling highly personalized recommendations. On the content creation front, AI tools—ranging from multimodal generation to natural language processing and text‑to‑image/video—can rapidly turn creative concepts into high‑quality promotional assets, greatly boosting efficiency.

Turning to logistics and delivery, Chen observed that advances in algorithms and computing power have significantly improved large models’ capabilities in environmental perception, route planning, and intelligent decision‑making. These improvements provide robust support for smart dispatch and exception handling in e‑commerce logistics, while also noticeably enhancing the end‑user delivery experience. He believes that multimodal delivery systems are becoming mainstream, with ground‑based unmanned vehicles and low‑altitude drones working together to create a dense, three‑dimensional transport network. In controlled environments such as industrial parks and residential communities, large‑scale unmanned delivery is already fully viable. As technology continues to evolve and regulatory frameworks for road use improve, the share of unmanned delivery in overall logistics will keep growing, becoming a critical pillar of future smart logistics and driving sustained cost reduction, efficiency gains, and better customer experiences. (Source: CCTV Reporter Wu Huijun; Text: Shien-Ming Wu School of Intelligent Engineering)

Related Program Links

CCTV News App:

https://content-static.cctvnews.cctv.com/snow-book/video.html?item_id=6865270323988464912

Global Financial Update (CNR Economy):

“AI Reshapes the Entire E‑Commerce Chain: An Efficiency Revolution Underway

https://ytweb.radio.cn/share/albumPlay?correlateId=3322367&columnId=15752762448510

“Smarter Shelves, Smarter Robots: Warehousing Enters the ‘Goods‑to‑Person’ Era

https://ytweb.radio.cn/share/albumPlay?correlateId=3324349&columnId=15752762448510

News Now (CNR):

https://ytweb.radio.cn/share/columnPlay?correlateId=980401295&columnId=1396551