From this month, people in London, Düsseldorf and Bern may bump into a delivery robot. Technology company Starship Technologies will test delivery robots in these cities. For this, the company is working together with Just-Eat, Metro Group (known for MediaMarkt), Pronto and German parcel delivery company Hermes.
The robots from Starship Technologies, a company created by Skype founders Janus Frijs and Ahti Heinia, are designed to deliver orders within 15 to 30 minutes. The robots have a range of up to five kilometres. They deliver autonomously, but are monitored by humans from control centres. They can intervene at any time. The robots have already been tested by Starship Technologies in recent months. They covered some eight thousand kilometres, passing some 400,000 passers-by in the process. According to Starship Technologies, not once did this lead to a collision.
The collaboration with parcel delivery company Hermes is striking. The German company said in a comment that it wants to automate its last mile and bet on individual deliveries. "Nobody wants to have to wait a long time for the delivery driver to come to you on his round," CEO Frank Rausch said. "Individually scheduled deliveries will become increasingly important in the coming years."
Editorial LogistiekProfs
