The COVID-19 outbreak is accelerating the adoption of autonomous sidewalk delivery robots in the US, as startups Starship and Kiwibot scramble to meet demand
“We saw that business double overnight,” startup says of UK grocery deliveries. — On the morning of March 30 …
Ars TechnicaTimothy B. Lee
Context & Ripple Effects
Starship spent four years building toward this moment: it began testing six-wheeled sidewalk robots in the UK, Germany, and Switzerland in 2016, then launched campus-focused delivery services in Europe and the US in 2018. The COVID-19 lockdown turned that slow-burn rollout into a demand shock, with the company reporting its UK grocery delivery business doubled overnight as contactless delivery became a necessity rather than a novelty.
The significance is that a pandemic-era spike is converting sidewalk robots from a curiosity into a proven last-mile channel — Starship's fleet went on to serve locked-down residents in Milton Keynes, and US college campuses emerged as the ideal proving ground for scaling the concept.
First-order effects
Starship and Kiwibot are scrambling to scale fleets and operations to meet surging US demand, with grocery and food delivery volume arriving faster than either startup planned for.
Consumers under lockdown gain a contactless delivery option that human couriers cannot safely match, making robots a health-safety service rather than a gimmick.
Second-order effects
Grocers and restaurants gain a low-cost last-mile option that does not depend on scarce delivery labor during lockdowns, pushing more merchants to list sidewalk-robot delivery as a standard fulfillment channel.
Campuses, already Starship's target market since its 2018 launch, harden into the de facto proving ground where the unit economics and pedestrian safety case get tested before broader city rollouts.
Third-order effects
If pandemic-normalized contactless delivery sticks after lockdowns lift, sidewalk robots shift from pilot programs to permanent municipal infrastructure, forcing cities to write rules for robot traffic on sidewalks.
The pattern — crisis compressing years of adoption into months — positions last-mile automation as a resilience investment for retailers, with the campus-to-city expansion path determining which operators win.
The trend: The pandemic is compressing sidewalk delivery robots' adoption curve from campus novelty to mainstream last-mile infrastructure, with contactless demand doing what years of pilots could not.
Another technology that makes complete sense now. Delivery Robots -> The COVID-19 outbreak is accelerating the adoption of autonomous sidewalk delivery robots in the US, as startups Starship and Kiwibot scramble to meet demand https://arstechnica.com/... https://twitter.com/...
My deep dive into the sidewalk robot delivery market isn't getting many clicks but I think it will be an important economic trend. By the end of the decade, free (and tip-free) robot delivery will be a standard option for restaurants in urban areas. https://arstechnica.com/...
Pandemic winners? Robots “Sidewalk robots won't eliminate human-driven food delivery entirely. We'll need bigger, faster robots that travel in the street to reach customers ... But Starship's rapid growth is a sign of what's to come.”@FrankPasquale https://arstechnica.com/...
“If, like, a group of people surrounded the robot and blocked it, the robot would identify the situation and say 'Hello I'm a Starship delivery robot. Can you please let me pass,'” https://arstechnica.com/...
“Nevertheless, the coronavirus pandemic has brought into focus the suitability of robots for fast, short-distance delivery from local businesses, and in other contexts where time—and safety—is of the essence, such as health care.” https://www.wsj.com/...
Yeah lots of these aren't “robots” though - they're being ‘monitored’ (read: DRIVEN) remotely by people being paid even more poorly than human delivery drivers in countries without labor protection laws. Yes, really - it's like if Mike Judge did GHOST IN THE SHELL. https://twitte…
No it's not. It's bringing us closer to people paid below minimum wage to pretend to be robots, because humans are cheaper to maintain and replace than robots https://twitter.com/...
An important piece. In future natural disasters, we will suffer less due to drone delivery of key supplies. The Scramble for Delivery Robots Is On and Startups Can Barely Keep Up https://www.wsj.com/...
Perfect example of Low-end Disruption in action. It's hard to disrupt cars with autonomy because you can't be “good enough” with human lives. But you can be “good enough” with pizza in walkable distances. Expect this to take off rapidly. https://arstechnica.com/...
The world is never going back to old patterns of retail. We'll need more delivery of every kind. It will keep dangerous people (all of us, potentially infected) away from the folks who keep us fed and clothed. https://www.wsj.com/...
🤖 Delivery robots were supposed to be about cost and convenience. 🦠Then coronavirus hit, and everyone who could make them pivoted to helping. 🌎From North Dakota to Tel Aviv, Hangzhou to Sacramento, this is their story: https://www.wsj.com/...
One outcome of the pandemic - fast-forwarding to a future of autonomous delivery - be they robots or drones. Every startup/in-house PoC now getting a shot in the arm! https://www.wsj.com/... https://twitter.com/...
I'm still curious how the hell these are gonna work in neighborhoods where package theft is rampant and sidewalks are often broken or otherwise neglected. https://twitter.com/...
This is a wonderful and informative long-form article by @binarybits on the accelerating future of delivery robots. You should reward him with your clicks! https://twitter.com/... https://twitter.com/...
“With lower costs and no need to tip, robots could make takeout more popular than ever as it gradually displaces human-driven food deliveries.” https://arstechnica.com/... @binarybits