ICE Smart delivery | Project Teaser

Smart Delivery For ICE too

Strategic Project Highlights (An overview)

Problem Space

Today, nearly 70% of Amazon’s delivery fleet still consists of traditional internal combustion engine (ICE) vans, which lack the intelligent systems and ergonomic design of the Rivian EDV. As a result, a significant portion of our global transporters are unable to benefit from the improved safety, efficiency, and user experience we’ve delivered through the EDV platform.

This presented a clear and urgent opportunity: How might we bring the Rivian UX advantage - smart automation, streamlined workflows, and trusted in-vehicle systems - to the existing ICE fleet?

-Where and what are the source of data and sensors that can provide this natural automation?

-What are the dependencies that constraint us to deliver this desired and intuitive experience?

With strong backing from senior leadership, we embraced this challenge not as a retrofit effort, but as a chance to scale our delivery UX innovation to reach even more transporters. Our goal was simple: extend the same thoughtful, safety-first experience to every transporter, regardless of vehicle type and raise the baseline for fleet performance worldwide.

What and How

Partnering with a principal product manager and a principal engineer, I initiated explorations and prototyped designs to adapt Rivian-like automation for ICE vans, addressing inherent limitations. Key challenges included integrating a new display without degrading vehicle native ergonomics and OEM safety functions, all while complying with stringent NHTSA and Euro NCAP safety guidelines. This required prototyping both physical interior design components and redesigning the application UX for a cohesive single-display experience with Rivian EDV and mobile app. Through numerous iterations of physical design and delivery application refinement, we achieved safety certification for driving and delivered a single-display experience that transporters genuinely wanted to use. We conducted extensive pilot launches across diverse regions and weather conditions to uncover all edge cases. After 6 months of deep collaboration with engineering and product, we successfully transitioned the initiative to a full-scope production program that we know will delight a larger group of transporters.

Project initiation: Q2 2022
Soft launch in US and EU 2025

Impact

Without the full production launch survey yet, following compounded user insights from iterated pilots. The early overall user sentiment was 3.5 to 4.1, driving safety hit high bar between 4.8 to 4.9, maps wayfinding performs higher than mobile at 4.3 to 4.5, Ease-of-Use earned 4.5. Among all early user insights, I am confident this will bring what we envision of bringing contextual automation to every transporter is a reality. A few pilot lowlights led to take action to reset product and UX a couple times, these were necessary to deliver best ergonomics, comfort and ultimately product end to end reliability for the expected 7 years life span.

Interaction flow improved 34% per a stop delivery:

Transporter mobile: 15 steps/stop
ICE Smart delivery UX: 10 steps/stop

Optimized for Eyes On The Roads design safety principal custom physical mount design
Better ergonomics design than OEMs display

Transporter anecdotes:

“It makes your day easier because you can see all your stops and see if you are passing other stops so you don’t have to double back”

“As soon as I shift to P, the mobile sets itself automatically for me to deliver without extra steps.

And?

This project reinforced a core truth of UX leadership: designing at scale is not just about delivering features—it’s about navigating constraints with purpose. ICE vans were never intended to support intelligent, in-vehicle systems, but through creative thinking, persistence, and cross-functional alignment, we were able to transform that limitation into an opportunity.

The challenge wasn’t just technical—it was human. Transporters needed a system that respected their time, habits, and safety. Every design decision had to balance compliance, physical ergonomics, and psychological load—without sacrificing performance or trust.

What I’m most proud of is that we didn’t settle for “good enough.” We made tough calls, reset our direction when needed, and always returned to the core principle: designing for the people behind the wheel. Bringing automation and smart delivery tools to the broader fleet not only improved operations—it helped more drivers go home safer, sooner, and less fatigued.

This work has deepened my belief that the best UX at scale is invisible—but profoundly felt. And I’m excited to carry that mindset into every system I help build next.