Self-Driving Delivery Robots To Hit Sidewalks of London In 2016 (thestack.com)

An anonymous reader writes: Estonian start-up Starship Technologies is taking a different approach to automated delivery with a ground-based self-driving robot. Headquartered in London and launched by two ex-Skype founders, the robotics company has unveiled its suburban pavement-strolling bot which can travel at a speedy 4mph. Starship claims that the 40-pound machine could deliver packages in 5 to 30 minutes from local retailers and restaurants. The company argues that a grounded approach to automated delivery will remove some of the safety concerns linked to flying drone systems, as the robot is much less likely to cause harm.

Comments

Re: 40 pounds?

[tgibson]

It's in the UK, plenty of surveillance.

That doesn't deter, does it? Isn't there a lot of crime in London despite the surveillance?

The Dalek problem

[moonlandingchap]

Knowing the streets of London, there are lots of kurbs, sunken manhole covers, uneven paving slabs and just hundreds of road crossings. This thing better have some clever way of keeping moving over quite rough ground without getting stuck. Meanwhile if it's carrying anything worth delivering then someone will try to have it away. Also most Londoners don't live on the ground floor, how does it get the attention of the target person to come and meet it in the street? The project will probably fail and the police will hijack it and use them as camera drones. Maybe even parking enforment.

London doesn't have "sidewalks"

[YuppieScum]

London has pavements.