11.5-ton trucks to circulate among 4 sub-terminals

Company pushes autonomous driving beyond highways into urban middle-mile routes

A CJ Logistics freight truck used for parcel delivery. [CJ Logistics]
A CJ Logistics freight truck used for parcel delivery. [CJ Logistics]

CJ Logistics will operate autonomous freight transport on urban middle-mile routes — the segments connecting logistics hubs — expanding its autonomous driving experience from highways into city logistics environments, where the technology's safety and operational capabilities can be tested under real-world conditions.

CJ Logistics announced Thursday that it will formally launch an autonomous freight transport project on middle-mile routes in the Daegu area starting in October, in partnership with Daegu Metropolitan City and the Intelligent Automotive Parts Research Institute. The project extends the company's existing highway-based autonomous driving operations into urban segments, with the goal of validating both the technology and its operational readiness in a live logistics environment.

The pilot will deploy 11.5-ton trucks carrying actual cargo on a circuit among four CJ Logistics sub-terminals in the Daegu area. Test runs to verify schedule compliance and safety will begin next month, after which the company plans to operate an autonomous freight delivery service through the first half of next year.

The routes pass through urban environments with signalized intersections and mixed traffic involving vehicles and pedestrians — considerably more complex conditions than the highway-focused operations the company has conducted to date. Distances between sub-terminals in the Daegu area range from 4.2 kilometers to 26 kilometers. CJ Logistics said it expects to gather autonomous driving data and real logistics operational data covering a wide range of urban traffic situations.

CJ Logistics previously ran an autonomous freight pilot with autonomous driving startup Mars Auto on the 218-kilometer Incheon–Okcheon corridor for about a year starting in March 2024, becoming the first company in South Korea's logistics industry to accumulate real-world autonomous freight experience. Through that program, the company collected operational data across daytime, nighttime and adverse-weather conditions, and verified the stability and viability of the autonomous driving technology.

The current project builds on that highway experience to extend autonomous driving into urban middle-mile segments. CJ Logistics said it plans to continue refining its autonomous driving technology using data accumulated during live logistics operations and to gradually broaden its application to other logistics sites nationwide.

"After becoming the first in the domestic logistics industry to accumulate autonomous freight operating experience, we are now expanding the technology into the more demanding environment of urban middle-mile routes," a CJ Logistics official said. "We will accelerate the commercialization of autonomous logistics and continue strengthening our future logistics competitiveness, drawing on our nationwide logistics network and real operational data."

Meanwhile, CJ Logistics has also been actively working to identify and develop talent, recently holding "Future Technology Challenge 2026," a logistics technology competition designed to solve real-world problems at logistics sites and find technically skilled candidates with strong operational understanding. The competition is a hands-on contest in which participants develop AI algorithms to address problems that arise in actual logistics environments.


eyre@heraldcorp.com