Company:Starship Technologies
 | |
| Founded | 2014 |
|---|---|
| Founders | Janus Friis and Ahti Heinla |
| Headquarters | San Francisco , California |
Key people | Lex Bayer (CEO) |
| Website | www |
Starship Technologies is a company developing small self-driving robotic delivery vehicles. The company is headquartered in San Francisco , with engineering operations in Tallinn, Estonia. Starship also has offices in London, UK, Germany , Washington, DC and Mountain View, California. [1]
Starship's robots have traveled tens of thousands of miles and met millions of people in over 100 cities and 20 countries around the world.[citation needed]
History
Starship Technologies was founded in 2014 by Skype co-founders Janus Friis and Ahti Heinla.[1] Ahti Heinla also acts as the CTO of the company.[2][3].
In January 2017, Starship announced $17.2 million in seed funding.
In June 2018, the company earned seed investment of $25 million from its existing investors along with the Co-founder of Airbnb and Skype founding engineer, while also announcing the appointment of Lex Bayer as CEO.[4]
In April 2019, Starship Technologies celebrated its 50,000th commercial delivery in Milton Keynes, UK.[5]
In August 2019, Starship Technologies has made over 100,000 commercial deliveries and is the first autonomous vehicle company to do that. [6]
Delivery Robots
The electric-powered robots ride on sidewalks at a pedestrian speed (max 6 km/h), can be remote-controlled if autonomous operation fails, and will only be used for relatively short-range local delivery.[7]
The robots are equipped with a sensor suite that includes cameras, GPS and inertial measurement unit, possibly also other sensors but notably no LIDAR. The robots have speakers, so they can communicate with humans they meet.
Commercial Operations
Starship Technologies launched pilot services in 2016, in the US and the UK among other countries, with commercial services launched in 2017.[7]
In April 2018, Starship launched its autonomous delivery service in Milton Keynes, UK. The company works in partnership with both Co-op and Tesco in Milton Keynes.[8]
In January 2019, Sodexo, Inc. partnered with Starship Technologies to launch robot food delivery services at George Mason University to its 40,000 students, faculty, and staff. With a fleet of 25 robots at launch, this initiative was the largest implementation of autonomous robot food delivery services on a university campus.[9][10]
In March 2019, Starship announced the expansion of its services to Northern Arizona University in Flagstaff.
In September 2019, Starship expanded its services to Purdue University in West Lafayette starting with a fleet of 30 robots.
In October 2019, Starship expanded operations to University of Pittsburgh.
In November 2019, Starship expanded its service to University of Wisconsin in Madison and University of Houston.
In December 2019, Starship expanded operations to The University of Texas at Dallas.[11] UT Dallas students popularly call the food delivery robots by the name "Tobor".
The company charges a flat rate fee of $1.99 per delivery.
See also
- Nuro, a similar autonomous delivery vehicle, though larger at the size of a tiny car, and driving on the road.
References
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 "About Us". Starship Technologies. 2016. https://www.starship.xyz/about-us/. Retrieved 2016-08-30.
- ↑ "Ahti Heinla - Co-Founder, CEO, & CTO @ Starship Technologies - Crunchbase". https://www.crunchbase.com/person/ahti-heinla.
- ↑ "Ahti Heinla - Starship Technologies". Starship Technologies. https://www.starship.xyz/ahti-heinla/.
- ↑ "Robot delivery firm Starship Technologies has hired an Airbnb veteran as its new CEO and raised $25 million". Business Insider. http://www.businessinsider.com/starship-technologies-hires-airbnb-exec-as-ceo-and-raises-25-million-2018-6.
- ↑ https://www.engadget.com/2019/04/10/starship-robots-50000-deliveries/
- ↑ "Starship Technologies raises $40M, crosses 100K deliveries and plans to expand to 100 new universities" (in en-US). http://social.techcrunch.com/2019/08/20/starship-technologies-raises-40m-crosses-100k-deliveries-and-plans-to-expand-to-100-new-universities/.
- ↑ 7.0 7.1 Ivana Kottasova (3 November 2015). "Forget drones, here come delivery robots". CNNMoney. http://money.cnn.com/2015/11/03/technology/starship-delivery-robots/.
- ↑ https://www.thegrocer.co.uk/co-op-expands-robot-deliveries-to-second-store/591944.article
- ↑ "World’s Largest Fleet of Delivery Robots on a University Campus Launched by Sodexo and Starship Technologies" (in en). https://www.sodexousa.com/cms/render/live/en/sites/sdxcom-us/home/media/news-releases/newsListArea/news-releases/starship-technologies.html.
- ↑ "There are robots on campus—here’s what you need to know | George Mason". https://www2.gmu.edu/news/574036.
- ↑ News (TNS), Melissa Repko The Dallas Morning. "On University of Texas at Dallas’ growing campus, meal-delivering robots make splashy debut" (in en). https://www.theeagle.com/on-university-of-texas-at-dallas-growing-campus-meal-delivering/article_3bb395b1-cb91-5208-9d6d-cee2d58017b0.html.
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