Mercedes-Benz Vans has taken a stake in a Silicon Valley drone maker as it envisions a future wher delivery drivers use the flying robots attached to the roofs of their trucks to zip packages the final short distances to homes and businesses.

To make its point, the delivery truck arm of Germany's Daimler — best known for its Sprinter vans — has made a sizable investment in Matternet, a commercial drone maker based in Menlo Park, Calif.

At a presentation in Stuttgart, Germany, Mercedes-Benz Vans showed off an electric "Vision Van" concept that it says innovates by being fully digitally connected so its cargo can be tracked by both the deliverer and customer. It has at least two drones on top ready to fly at a moment's notice.

Mercedes foresees a time when a delivery van could be parked in a neighborhood. While the driver delivers one package, a pair of drones are dropping off another two.

"For these little robotic helpers, the van will be the mothership," said Volker Mornhinweg, head of Mercedes-Benz Vans. "Drones and robots will swarm out like bees working hard for our customers' business."

The goal, he says, is to reduce the work that a typically busy delivery driver endures on daily rounds. A driver tasked with dropping off 180 parcels needs to resort the cargo 10 times during the shift, stop at least three or four minutes for every dropoff and take 2,000 steps an hour.

Matternet said its completely autonomous M2 drone can carry up to 4.4 pounds for trips up to 12 miles. It's designed to work in both urban and rural environments, including a built-in parachute that drops if it encounters a power failure or other trouble. Flight paths can be created over approved routes.

The company says it not only has a "strategic relationship" with Mercedes-Benz Vans, but that the van maker has made a "multimillion-dollar investment."

“In Mercedes-Benz Vans, we found a partner that is not only synonymous with quality, safety, reliability and efficiency, but is also willing to imagine and create the future of transportation with us,” said Andreas Raptopoulos, co-founder and CEO of Matternet. “We are driven by a common vision to automate last-mile logistics, which today is the least efficient and most expensive part of logistics. Through this partnership, we are building solutions that will dramatically reduce the time and cost of on-demand delivery.”