Starship Technologies is making delivery robots and they just received $40 million in funding. The robots are advanced devices that can carry items within a 4-mile (6km) radius. Our delivery platform enables a new era of instant delivery that works around your schedule at much lower costs.
The company has made over 100,000 commercial deliveries. The total funding has reached $85 million.
Parcels, groceries and food are directly delivered from stores, at the time that the customer requests via a mobile app. Once ordered the robots’ entire journey and location can be monitored on a smartphone.
Starship delivery bots use machine learning to detect objects and do not use expensive LIDAR. Starship robots mostly drive on sidewalks and cross streets when they need to. This poses a different set of challenges compared to self-driving cars. Traffic on car roads is more structured and predictable.
Safe and Secure
Starship’s robots move at pedestrian speed and weigh no more than 100 pounds. They’re inherently safe and can navigate around objects and people.
For security, the cargo bay is mechanically locked throughout the journey and can be opened only by the recipient with their smartphone app. The location of the robots is tracked, so you know exactly the location of your order and receive a notification at the time of arrival.
Savings Everywhere
The entire delivery platform is both energy- and cost-efficient and can be used for a large variety of tasks. In comparison to more traditional delivery services, things such as groceries, packages and food can be delivered for a fraction of the cost.
Brian Wang is a Futurist Thought Leader and a popular Science blogger with 1 million readers per month. His blog Nextbigfuture.com is ranked #1 Science News Blog. It covers many disruptive technology and trends including Space, Robotics, Artificial Intelligence, Medicine, Anti-aging Biotechnology, and Nanotechnology.
Known for identifying cutting edge technologies, he is currently a Co-Founder of a startup and fundraiser for high potential early-stage companies. He is the Head of Research for Allocations for deep technology investments and an Angel Investor at Space Angels.
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It is a question of economy and chance to get away with it.
You tamper with a nice looking robot and get various degrees of felonies throw at you by the prosecutors.
You think you can get away with it? The range is pretty small and a few aerial drones can record the travels and the people interacting with the robots.
How much do you think they will make robbing the groceries? How often they will do it? How long before they are caught?
It is a 80/20 problem. Few people causing the majority of the trouble. You get them, get rid of the most trouble then make an example of them, the rest learn to leave the robot alone and you get rid of all the trouble.
Now, things walk around looking for teenagers to break.
When I was a teenager I used to walk around looking for things to break.
OK, maybe you guys do have a serious crime problem.
In Australia a letter box is a box, usually located out in the footpath area so the postman doesn’t have to get off his bike. And yes, anyone can walk up and grab anything that was delivered.
Nobody would though. Except apparently criminals from the UK.
Though when I get something large delivered the postie usually takes the trouble to walk up and put it besides the front door out of the rain/sun/view of casual passersby.
Don’t see Estonia in the article, and the company site lists 7 different contact addresses – only one is in Estonia.
Hillariously short lived in many parts of London, too.
Isn’t that comparing apples with oranges though?
Limited experience of other countries but in the UK a letter box is usually a slot in the front door, too small to get an arm through, and is generally about 1/3rd or so up the door, so you can’t even get a hand through to grab what may be on the other side. Not an actual box out in the open for anyone to rifle through.
More likely to get your hand chewed by a dog than grab anything useful, and it’s not trundling unescorted through the neighbourhood.
Guess I’m really saying these automated delivery ideas often seem great in a limited local low crime environment where you have some degree of control, but tend to struggle with a raft foreseable consequences when unleashed in a wider area.
If you are that concerned about theft you would assume that normal postal services can’t work, because someone can just walk up and take things out of the letter box after they’ve been delivered.
Yes that can happen. But postal services have been in successful operation for hundreds of years.
The solution of course is not to live in a hellhole.
Does the article mention this is in Estonia? Estonia is pretty nice for a post-soviet country. Maybe the nicest. Yes, I agree this would be hilariously short lived in say South Africa or Belize. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crime_in_Estonia
Neat idea I guess, but they gloss over the biggest security issue – a couple of guys stuffing a foil bag over it and carrying it off to open at their leisure. So if this ever takes off I expect coverage to be limited to ‘safe’ areas only, and even then the above risk doesn’t go away.
Make it into a 100 pound Taser which fries anyone trying to tamper with it.