DANISH shipping giant Maersk is looking for a drone-making partner to conduct a test flight for a drone to transport a 10 kilogramme package over 10 kilometres to resupply its remotely-located ships, such as tankers, containerships and oil platforms.

This comes as the company has been exploring the usage of drones to deliver equipment to ships, after using the technology in January for delivering cookies to a tanker at sea over a distance of 250 metres. The parcel was picked up from one of its barges and dropped off on a tanker.

"The company is evaluating ways to expand its use of drones and plans a bigger test later this year," said a supply chain manager at Maersk, Markus Kuhn, who was speaking at the Drones Data X conference in San Francisco, reported the Press Trust of India.

By using drones for resupply, the company might be able to avoid sending an entire ship on an equipment delivery to a tanker, which it sometimes has to do to comply with regulations about protecting explosive cargo, it said.

Mr Kuhn added the company sees a lot of opportunities to use drones for inspecting equipment, including using them to reach places where humans cannot.