Amazon has also jumped into the world of autonomous vehicle R&D with the filing of U.S. Patent Application No. 20150277440, entitled Sense and Avoid for Automated Mobile Vehicles. The automated mobile vehicle claimed here has a body and a plurality of motors coupled to the body and a propellor to rotate a propellor, each motor having an exterior component, an interior component and a laser based rangefinder within the interior component to emit a laser signal and receive the reflection to determine a distance to the object. This system, which could be incorporated on air, water or ground-based vehicles, is meant to keep unmanned vehicles from colliding with each other, a technology which has been heavily sought by the drone community in response to concerns by federal regulators.
