Delivery Robotics, Drones & AVs

• Waymo had a rough optics cycle: one robotaxi blocked EMS during an Austin mass shooting response, while the NTSB is now officially investigating a vehicle passing a stopped school bus due to remote operator error.

• And yet scale keeps climbing. Waymo ridership is spiking, Zoox is expanding to Austin and Miami, and Uber is hedging with both Zoox and Wayve/Nissan.

  

• Policy is moving in both directions. The Feds are exploring fully driverless vehicles without controls, Virginia is targeting 2028 deployments, while California is tightening scrutiny over remote operators.

• Tesla’s autonomy stack looks more hybrid than advertised, with reports of remote human intervention in robotaxis and broader safety concerns resurfacing from AV experts.

• On delivery, DoorDash is launching Dot in the Bay Area ‘burb of Fremont, while Coco is improving localization through Niantic Spatial. Avride robots are now showing up near Philly too (good luck!)

• Serve Robotics continues scaling, launching White Castle delivery and reporting thousands of robots in-market — though collisions with bus shelters show the edge cases are still very real.

• Drones keep stacking momentum. Wing is expanding into the SF Bay Area, Manna raised $50 million, and Zipline pulled in another $200M.

• Grubhub is also finally leaning into drones, teaming up with Dexa in New Jersey.

• WeRide keeps expanding globally, launching in Slovakia and Singapore with Grab.

Humanoids

• China’s physical AI push is starting to look industrial. Time argues China is pulling ahead, while Unitree filed for a $610M IPO after scaling shipments and improving margins.

• Amazon is reportedly acquiring humanoid developer Fauna Robotics, right after gobbling up RIVR.

  

• Meanwhile, OpenAI’s robotics lead resigned over Pentagon-related concerns, a reminder that embodied AI quickly runs into governance questions.

Back of House Automation

• Simbe’s Tally became the first retail robot to achieve UL 3300 certification, removing a key blocker for broader in-store deployment.

• Instacart is pushing a “physical AI” retail stack built around Caper Carts and data integration, turning stores into sensor networks as much as storefronts.

  

  Catch Instacart’s Head of Product John Adams at Curbivore 2026!

Kiosks, Retail & Self-Checkout

• Costco has been using self-checkout machines since 2013, but the retail giant is now reportedly phasing them out, to be replaced with a “Scan and Go” experience.

Industry Trends

• Rivian spinout Mind Robotics raises $500M.

• Startup unicorns are back on the rise, pushed up by massive rounds for physical AI and robotics startups like BedRock Robotics and Spirit AI.

  

In Other News

Momenta files for IPO. VeryAI raises $10M for palm-based ID verification. Lucid Motors shows off Lunar robotaxi. Meet the people strapping cameras to their heads to train robots. Travis Kalanick launches Atoms. Ottobot heads to Australian mine town. DoorDash invests into Also. Starship launches at Florida Polytechnic University. China cracks down on drones. Avride hits 4,600 orders at Salisbury University. Glendale, CA calls for moratorium on delivery robots.

We’re two weeks away from Curbivore 2026 — returning to the Downtown LA Arts District on April 16th and 17th — and we’ve got a special perk for Ottomate Pro subscribers like yourself: complimentary admission!

Read more

At the center is founder and CEO Andreas Raptopoulos, who’s been building toward this moment since 2011, back when drones were still synonymous with military uses or hobbyist tinkering. In the conversation below, we unpack Matternet’s evolution from humanitarian logistics to urban delivery platform, why he rejects the hub-and-spoke model, how the unit economics work, and what it might take for drones to move from novelty to everyday utility.

Jonah Bliss: Let’s start at a high level, what’s the Matternet story?

Andreas Raptopoulos: In 2010, I came across what was happening in the DIY drone space. I came into the space with a question, “has something changed in the technology landscape that would allow us to build a different kind of flying vehicle?”

As I started thinking through what was happening, I realized there was a DIY drone movement building up. People were taking sensors popularized through smartphones, computers, GPS units, and creating these tiny quadcopters that could aviate and navigate by themselves.

When I saw that, I thought: this is going to change how the world does transportation—for goods and eventually for people.

That led me to start Matternet in 2011. We were among the first companies to talk about drones as a civilian tool. Back then, drones were mostly associated with the military.

We started by asking: where could this have immediate impact? These systems weren’t permitted in the U.S. or Europe yet—but there were places in the world with no transportation infrastructure at all. So we focused on those.

We did projects in Haiti and the Dominican Republic in 2012, then Bhutan and Papua New Guinea in 2014, and later Malawi. We worked with organizations like Doctors Without Borders, the World Health Organization, and UNICEF.

The idea was leapfrogging: in places without roads, could you skip straight to aerial transport—like how cellular skipped landlines?

For the first few years, up until 2014, we focused entirely on humanitarian work. I gave a talk in 2013—“If there are no roads, there’s a drone for that”—and that really became how people understood what we were doing.

But eventually, I realized humanitarian funding wouldn’t be enough. It was clear we’d need something like $100M+ to build the full technology stack. So we pivoted to commercial use cases.

We entered Switzerland in 2015 and started working with regulators and Swiss Post to figure out how to safely operate drones over cities.

We knew that about 80% of last-mile delivery happens in urban and suburban areas. And something like 85–86% of Amazon shipments are under 2 kg.

So the question became: how do we build a system that regulators and the public trust in those environments?

In 2017, we became the first company approved to fly over cities in Switzerland. We focused first on healthcare—transporting diagnostics, lab samples, and medicines between facilities.

If you look at a system like UCSF, there are dozens of locations moving samples and materials all day. If you can reduce that to 5–10 minutes, it changes efficiency and patient outcomes significantly.

We’ve always been told BVLOS is just around the corner…

Yeah, exactly. And now it finally is here.

We partnered with UPS in 2019 and launched the first commercial drone delivery service in the U.S. A lot of people were doing pilots at the time—but this was a real operation.

Our philosophy is different from most. We don’t want to be UPS—we want to be Apple or Tesla. We want to build the machines and systems that others operate.

So with UPS, we provided the full stack: the drones, the ground infrastructure, and the software. They operated the system.

Then COVID hit, and BVLOS timelines slipped.

But in 2022, we became the first—and still the only—company with a drone delivery system type-certified by the FAA. That process took four and a half years.

About 14 months ago, we launched our first home delivery product. Up until then, we were only doing B2B healthcare. Now we’re expanding into food and retail.

Can you talk a bit about the unit economics, especially outside of healthcare?

In healthcare, we already have positive unit economics. Customers are willing to pay $20+ per delivery, depending on the market.

For food delivery, the target is different. We believe we can get costs well below $5 per delivery, while customers are willing to pay $6–$8.

To get there, a few things matter:

• You need volume—around 100 deliveries per day per location

• You can’t have people on-site operating drones

• You need low-cost, high-utilization aircraft

Think of it in terms of cost per flight hour. If an aircraft costs $20,000 and runs for 10,000 hours, that’s $2 per hour. If you can do 5–8 deliveries per hour, you’re looking at around $0.40 per delivery just for the aircraft.

Then you layer in batteries, real estate, supervision, and maintenance.

What does supervision look like?

Read more

Delivery Robotics, Drones & AVs

• Amazon Prime Air launched in Kansas City, Kansas, moving packages of up to 5 pounds to destinations within 7.5 miles of its fulfillment center eight miles west of downtown. (See map.)

• Just Eat and Starship are launching a collaboration, partnering on delivery robotics in the United Kingdom. The two companies are initially launching in Sunderland, a town of 288,000 in Northeastern England.

  

• Delivery drone startup Manna is partnering with Uber Eats to launch in Ireland, followed by an expansion to other EU markets. This is Uber’s first drone partner in the European Union.

• Speedbird Aero raised $5.8 million to expand drone deliveries in Brazil, with funders including local 3PD iFood.

• Waymo had a huge month: launches in Dallas, Houston, San Antonio, and Orlando; hitting 200 million autonomous miles driven; beginning tests in Chicago; and starting deployments of its sixth-generation Driver technology.

• Uber also made the case for why it — and not players like Waymo or Zoox — could win the long-term AV race. In a supplement to its 2025 earnings, the company noted it performed better in markets where it launched robotaxi services, while also beating its competitors’ purported benchmarks. The ridehail giant is also investing $100M in new robotaxi charging infrastructure, while debuting its Autonomous Solutions division.

  

• In other AV news: Senate Republicans push the SELF DRIVE Act forward; Bedrock Robotics raised $270M for autonomous excavators; Zoox began testing in Columbus, Ohio; Tesla’s Robotaxi network seems to be driving 4x worse than humans; Aurora’s autonomous trucks are hitting the highways between Arizona and Texas; Wayve raised $1.2 billion.

Humanoids

• LimX raised $200 million in Series B funding, with backing from Stone Venture, JD, and Oriental Fortune Capital. The Chinese startups’s Tron 1 biped retails for $15k and can purportedly ski.

  

• Is this an arms race?! Austin-based Apptronik has raised $520 million, at a $5B+ valuation. Backers include B Capital, Google, Mercedes-Benz, John Deere and the Qatar Investment Authority. This extension of their earlier round brings their total Series A funding to just shy of $1 billion.

Back of House Automation

• After just three months in service, Amazon is pulling the plug on project Blue Jay, a multi-armed robot meant to facilitate same-day orders. The company will instead focus on its lower-cost Orbital platform.

• Walmart Data Ventures launched Scintilla In-Store, a platform for supplier field reps that connects data streams to in-store actions.

• Burger King is piloting an AI chatbot — codenamed Patty and powered by OpenAI — in employee headsets at select locations.

Farm & Sourcing Automation

• With immigrant farm workers being cruelly forced out of the country, America’s big agriculture companies are facing a labor shortage, and they in turn are turning to robots to keep cows milked and crops picked.

Kiosks, Retail & Self-Checkout

• VenHub’s CEO announced the autonomous vending company is planning to file a direct listing on the Nasdaq, as a former exec from Amazon’s Just Walk Out project has joined the company. See our earlier review of VenHub’s mechanical mini-mart.

• Burger chain White Castle is getting into kiosks, partnering with Evolvending and Just Baked to bring its microwaved sliders to airports in Florida and Massachusetts.

  

Industry Trends

• Do too many robotics startups rely overly heavily on crowdfunding investors? Hunterbrook did a deep dive into the phenomenon, noting how less sophisticated investors can be suckered into backing companies with slim track records and scant operations. While the report specifically mentions Miso Robotics, we’ve seen many other companies in this sector rely on similar tactics.

In Other News

Learning from Zipline’s failures and successes. Hyundai’s making a $26B bet on robots and America. Meet Hyundai’s MobED robotics platform. Hesai and Grab collaborate on lidar. Alibaba launches open source RynnBrain. Ukrainian dual-use drones deliver cookies and perform combat. Toyota and Pony.ai start production of bZ4X robotaxi. Avride gets into ads. ODOT trials autonomous crash trucks to protect road workers. Teledyne FLIR debuts Lepton XDS thermal + visual camera. DoorDash launches Gemini for Android integration. LA Times looks at Next Robot. Can radar be used for end-to-end autonomy? Everyware restaurant self-checkout kiosks head to Hong Kong. Do healthcare drones pass the ROI smell test?

Coco Robotics Launches Coco 2 Delivery Bot

Los Angeles-based delivery bot biggie Coco Robotics revealed its new Coco 2 robot, at an exclusive event near Venice Beach, late last week. The larger robot features much-improved autonomy, IPX6 weather resilience (a vital factor for a company operating in both Miami and Helsinki) and the ability to operate on streets, bike lanes and sidewalks. While Coco has long prioritized lean and affordable hardware, the new version — which costs “around 10% of a car” — definitely has some higher-end additions, including an air blade on its cameras, heated glass and a hardware keypad for unlocking the storage compartment.

Hardware & Road Map Analysis

Read more

PARTNER | Autonomous Vehicle Impact Report

Early AV deployments may be reducing driver utilization and pressuring pay—here’s what the data shows.

The 2026 Autonomous Vehicles Impact Report compares AV-active cities to nationwide benchmarks to identify early changes in driver productivity and earnings as autonomous fleets expand.

Our findings include:

• Trips per hour declined nearly 2× faster in AV-active cities than nationwide

• Hourly gross pay fell in Los Angeles (-3.7%), Phoenix (-0.4%), and San Francisco (-1.7%) while growing 1.8% nationwide

• S&P Global projects AVs need pricing near $1 per mile to scale—and parity isn’t expected until ~2040–2041

Download the full report to understand how AVs may be impacting human drivers today—and what these early signals could mean next.

Download the Report

Delivery Robotics, Drones & AVs

• People love delivery bots! New data from Starship Robotics shows that 97% of students love or like the company’s machines. Starship served 65 university campuses in 2025, traveling 1.5 million miles.

  

• Waymo just raised a whopping $16 billion, valuing the AV leader at $126 billion. Alphabet remains the majority investor, with additional funding led by Dragoneer Investment Group, DST Global, and Sequoia Capital. Waymo has now driven 127 million autonomous miles, while providing 15 million rides in 2025 alone.

• Serve Robotics acquired Diligent Robotics, maker of Moxi The Robot — with a focus on healthcare applications. The acquisition was for $29 million, while Diligent had previously raised around $100M.

• Tesla claims to be making progress with its Austin, Texas-based Robotaxi pilot, as the company has removed the safety drivers from the car’s front seat. Internet sleuths counter that the company is actually still using safety drivers, however, they’ve simply been moved to a second, trailing vehicle.

• Medium-duty AV trucking player Gatik launched commercial operations, handling daily deliveries for Fortune 50 retailers in Texas, Arkansas and Arizona. The Mountain View, CA-based company now has $600 million plus in contracted revenue.

Humanoids

• Israeli AV tech player Mobileye is getting into the humanoid space, with the acquisition of Mentee Robotics, for approximately $900 million in stock and cash. Mentee’s focused on a human-to-robot mentoring plus few-shot learning powered approach.

• X Square Robot completed its Series A++ funding round, raising RMB 1 billion ($140M USD) for its wheeled humanoids and zero shot-based learning approach “robot brain.”

• 1X Technologies released a new world model for its NEO line of robots, allowing the humanoid to learn new tasks by watching online videos. (Better keep those bots off of TikTok!)

• NYC-based Fauna Robotics unveiled Sprout, a “robot you want to be around,” built for a developer audience.

  

• Too many humanoids?! Market research firm Gartner predicts that by 2028, under 100 companies will progress humanoid robots beyond experimentation, with less than 20 companies going live in production for supply chain and manufacturing uses. “The promise of humanoid robots is compelling, but the reality is that the technology remains immature and far from meeting expectations for versatility and cost-effectiveness,” said Abdil Tunca, Senior Principal Analyst in Gartner’s Supply Chain practice.

Back of House & Logistics Automation

• Amazon acquired truck and trailer unloading startup Rightbot, folding the startup into Amazon’s Robotics Delivery and Packaging Innovation (RDPI) team. While terms were not disclosed, Amazon previously invested $4 million into the startup’s seed round, attracted to the company’s approach to unstructured unloading.

  

Farm & Sourcing Automation

• Caterpillar partnered with NVIDIA. “As AI moves beyond data to reshape the physical world, it is unlocking new opportunities for innovation — from job sites and factory floors to offices,” said Caterpillar CEO Joe Creed. “Caterpillar is committed to solving our customers’ toughest challenges by leading with advanced technology in our machines and every aspect of business. Our collaboration with NVIDIA is accelerating that progress like never before.”

Kiosks, Retail & Self-Checkout

• AI voice ordering firm Presto closed on $10 million in new funding, led by Metropolitan Partners Group, with participation from Remus Capital, Link Ventures, and several strategic angel investors including the CEO of ElevenLabs.

• Amazon is discontinuing its Amazon One palm payment platform, which the ecommerce giant rolled out in the wake of the pandemic. Currently used by third party retailers, athletic facilities and gymnasia, the technology will be redeployed to healthcare settings.

• Amazon is shuttering its Amazon Fresh and Amazon Go branded markets, refocusing its efforts on Whole Foods and online delivery. The closure will affect around 70 locations, with the plurality based in California. In that case, it looks like the newest version of its Dash smart carts will be headed to Whole Foods only.

Industry Trends

• Shenzhen Picea Robotics Co. buys the assets of Roomba-maker iRobot for pennies on the dollar, after the iconic robotics brand filed for bankruptcy.

In Other News

Tesla’s diner went from hot to flop in six months. Stream and Uber partner on AV deliveries. Zipline raises $600M+ for drone deliveries. Is San Francisco contemplating revoking ban on delivery robots? Job alert: Matternet seeks Business Development Manager. $100M+ seed rounds make up a growing share of venture funding. Chinese AV trucking startup DeepWay raises $173M ahead of IPO. Pipedream Labs launched Goods. Kodiak AI partners with Bosch.

Our invite-only Urban Autonomy Summit, presented by Nexar, is shaping up to be a truly peerless gathering of autonomy and robotics’ most pivotal players. Speakers include:

• ​Andrew Chapin — COO, Nuro

• ​Xiaodi Hou — CEO & Founder, Bot Auto

• ​Jeremy Bird — Executive Vice President, Lyft

• ​Ashwini Anburajan — CEO, Obi

• ​Jeffrey Tumlin — Former Director of Transportation, SFMTA

• ​Neha Palmer — CEO, Terawatt

• Luc Vincent — Chief R&D Officer, Nexar

• ​Ryan Green — CEO & Co-Founder, Gridwise Analytics

• ​Matt Wood — VP of Safety and Validation, May Mobility

• ​Ashu Rege — Vice President of Autonomy & Head of DoorDash Labs, DoorDash

• ​Rachel Swan — Transportation Reporter, SF Chronicle

• ​Claire Eagen — Global Head of Legal, Vay

• ​Erin Galiger — Director, North American Markets, Rocsys

• ​Lora Kolodny — Tech Reporter, CNBC

• ​Rya Jetha — Tech Culture Reporter, SF Standard

• ​Jonathan Colbert — Head of Marketing, Voltera

Free Admission for Ottomate Pro Subscribers

Read more

Delivery Robotics, Drones & AVs

• Startship Technologies launched a new pilot project with Foodora, bringing automated restaurant and grocery deliveries to Prague. The service will start with three robots in Prague 8, serving a 2 km radius around McDonald’s Karlín.

  

• Serve Robotics expands its sidewalk bot delivery service to Ft. Lauderdale, Florida, in partnership with Uber Eats.

• Amazon’s aerial drone project faced yet another setback, with the FAA investigating a recent drone crash taking down local internet service in central Texas.

• DHL teamed up with Infineon Technologies and Zelostech to launch Singapore’s first supply chain-focused AV.

  

Humanoids

• The highly competitive humanoid space saw a new contender enter the arena: meet Paris-based UMA, focused on general-purpose robotics.

• British startup Humanoid unveiled the bipedal version of its HMND 01 Alpha, developed in only 5 months and able to walk “within 48 hours of assembly.”

• China’s Agibot delivered its 5,000th humanoid. The company, founded by ex-Huawei engineers, has four models in its lineup.

Back of House Automation

• Kroger closes three Ocado-powered automated grocery fulfillment centers, resulting in $350 million in one-time expenses.

• Chef Robotics released Chef+, with doubled ingredient capacity, reduced footprint, improved reliability, increased food safety and more.

Farm & Sourcing Automation

• Bushel Plus formed a strategic partnership with John Deere to make the Bushel Plus SmartPan system available through Deere’s U.S. and Canada dealer network. By physically collecting and calculating bushels-per-acre losses, the SmartPan System provides farmers with verification to calibrate and validate their automation.

Industry Trends

• Trump Administration looks to create national robotics strategy to compete with China.

Kiosks & Self-Checkout

• Sweet Robo revealed ChocoPrint, its first-ever 3D chocolate printer, at CES 2026.

In Other News

Olo integrates Zipline drone deliveries into its ordering platform. Mercado Libre adds Agility Robotics’ Digit humanoid to its facility in Texas. Serve Robotics builds 2,000th robot. Harper’s goes deep into humanoids and hype. Former Apple engineers raised $107M for Lyte, to improve robotic perception.

From strip malls in the Valley to the South Bay, Hollywood and the desert fringes, you can walk into the most forgettable-looking plaza imaginable and walk out having devoured a delicious, reasonably priced sushi meal. These places are essential to LA’s food culture — and lately, they’ve been struggling.

The pandemic pushed countless sushi chefs into early retirement. Those who remained have been squeezed by higher ingredient costs, rising wages, and ever-increasing rents. With that tricky context: can automation help these neighborhood institutions survive, and even thrive, for decades to come?

Inside LA Sushi Co., the vibe is contemporary but warm: bright blue tile, a handful of tables, and a generous display of fish behind the counter. That’s where I spot the machines I’m here to see — Autec’s maki and nigiri “sushi robots.”

The term “sushi robot” might conjure images of a blade-wielding automaton expertly slicing tuna, but these machines do something far more modest. They prepare rice.

Sushi rice is deceptively complex. It has to be seasoned with the right balance of sugar and vinegar, shaped consistently, and served at just the right temperature. It’s foundational to good sushi — and, as the chef working the bar explains, it’s also the least interesting part of an itamae’s job. The work is repetitive, physically demanding, and largely invisible to customers, even though it’s essential to every piece that leaves the counter.

I order a few rolls and nigiri, neatly presented in a Sugarfish-style box. The verdict: impressive. The rice is spot-on, the fish — still very much prepared by human hands — is excellent. This eight-piece box costs $21, which is borderline miraculous for this part of town. Walk 100 feet down the block to Katsuya, and you’ll pay more than that for just an order of rainbow rolls.

For Nate Hahn, the restaurant’s co-owner, the machines are central to making the economics work. He estimates they reduce labor costs by roughly 50%, while also speeding up throughput — critical for a business built around the lunch rush, both in-store and via delivery.

The efficiency gains matter even more at scale. LA Sushi Co. also operates locations inside several Southern California sports stadiums. Producing $80,000 worth of sushi during a halftime window, Hahn notes, simply wouldn’t be possible without this kind of automation.

Autec’s technology isn’t new. The company began developing sushi robots in the 1980s as a side project within Japanese audio giant Audio-Technica. What’s changed is adoption: in recent years, these machines have quietly proliferated. There are now an estimated 200 to 300 in Southern California alone.

That spread reflects a broader truth about automation in food service. The most successful applications aren’t about replacing humans with flashy androids — they’re removing the most repetitive, least rewarding tasks so that workers can focus on craft, quality, and customer experience.

If keeping affordable sushi lunches on the menu in Los Angeles requires machines that make better rice, more consistently, and at a lower cost, that feels less like a dystopian future and more like a pragmatic compromise. In a city where everything else keeps getting more expensive, this may be automation at its best: quiet, boring, and in service of something deeply human.

Waymo has famously taken an HD maps approach, while Tesla has been an even more vocal proponent of going mapless. Other companies have taken the no maps approach as well: Imagry, founded in Haifa and led by CEO Eran Ofir, is one of the companies betting that a lighter, perception-driven stack can make autonomy more deployable and affordable. The company’s camera-based system has been tested on buses and shuttles in Israel, Japan, Germany, and the U.S., with a focus on constrained but commercially meaningful routes. As the industry moves past the hype cycle of robotaxi demos and into the harder work of sustainable deployment, Imagry’s experience offers a useful lens into what autonomy looks like when it has to perform outside the lab — whether that future is mapped to the centimeter or not. We checked in with Eran to get his latest thoughts on the mapping debate.

Ottomate News: To start, give us the elevator pitch for Imagry.

Eran Ofir: Imagry delivers vision-based autonomous driving solutions without HD maps, lidar, or the cloud. We are pioneering Generative Autonomy: real-time intelligence that drives machines in the physical world. Our AI-centric platform, unlike rule-based systems, learns from experience and adapts to any road, vehicle, or condition, just like a human, only better.

Already deployed across transit and fleet vehicles, Imagry is solving the scalability challenge for both public transportation and passenger cars. Our real-time, hardware-agnostic architecture integrates seamlessly with existing platforms, giving automakers and transit operators a cost-effective, production-ready autonomy solution.

The next leap in GenAI isn’t a chatbot. It’s a driver. Today we drive buses and cars. Tomorrow, we power every intelligent machine that moves.

Most AV stacks still lean on HD maps, even if they talk about “reducing” dependence. What made you confident enough to go fully mapless, and where do you see that choice giving Imagry an enduring advantage vs. players like Mobileye or Wayve who also push lower-map approaches?

Imagry has always believed in the philosophical approach that an AI autonomous driving system should completely mimic the way people think and act. We humans don’t drive with HD maps, since we see the road and understand it. It has always been our premise (since 2018) that a full, uncompromised AI solution is the only practical approach to autonomous driving. We knew this approach would eventually be viable and ultimately prevail (once edge computing in the vehicle would be capable enough, which happened approximately two years ago). Currently only Tesla, Imagry, and Wayve have such capability. This provides us with a huge advantage in project bids, as it means that our vehicles/buses can drive everywhere, and not just in a small and limited geo-fenced area dictated by the HD-map being used by the less advanced players in the market.

You’ve previously said big parts of the AV industry spent billions on flashy demos while you focused on making autonomy actually work in daily service. What did you do differently in your first real deployments—like the autonomous buses in Israel—and what surprised you most when theory met messy real-world operations?

Our approach wasn’t to do demos that would look nice but be built on weak technology. Rather, from the get-go we built the foundation of an AI system that learns by imitation. Also, we didn’t take the unsupervised approach, which is quick and dirty, but the supervised approach to AI training, which is much slower but serves as a very solid foundation for training the neural networks.

When we got on the road (in the U.S., Germany, Japan, Israel…), we learned that lab simulations have little to do with real autonomous driving on public, mixed traffic roads. We learned that keeping latency to a minimum is of paramount importance, and every small change there leads to significant different behavior. We learned that urban driving (which is our forte) is much more complex than highway driving, and we learned how difficult and sophisticated a system should be in order to be able to drive on both sides of the road (most players in the world drive only on right-hand-side or left-hand-side, but not both with the same system, as Imagry does).

Imagry is camera-only and hardware-agnostic, which may be attractive on cost—but safety regulators and OEMs love redundancy. How do you make the safety case for a vision-only system, and what are the long tail risks you worry about?

It has been proven time and again that the need for lidar and radar is not real and was only pushed by their vendors (all of whom have lost >90% of their value since coming on the scene). In the AI era, a camera-based system that sees 100m-300m and 360 degrees doesn’t need lidar or radar that anyhow don’t understand what they see and can’t understand colors and signs. We humans are not equipped with lidar and radars and yet regulators trust us to drive well! Also, given that the response time of our system is at least 3 times faster than a human, it is safer than a human driver. Tesla, XPeng, Volvo, and Imagry are already using vision-only systems, and I expect that by the end of the decade, most OEMs will adopt the vision-only approach. Cameras are continually improving. Now we also drive in dark nights using thermal cameras. We work closely with regulators globally, and they understand now that the old adage “hardware will solve it all” has become extinct; now it’s AI software that rules.

Join AV and AI leaders at the Urban Autonomy Summit, an invite-only gathering, Jan. 28th in San Francisco. Apply to attend now.

Who do you see as your main customers over the next five years: transit operators, Tier-1s, or the OEMs themselves? And what do partnerships look like in terms of integration, revenue models, data sharing and the like?

Our target customers for our autonomous buses are public transportation operators (PTOs) and municipalities, and fleets (for our roboshuttle offering). Yes, we do work with OEMs, but as partners for providing the needed pre-integrated vehicles to our customers.

You’re live or testing in multiple regions—from Israel to the U.S., Germany and Japan. What are the hidden bottlenecks to scaling from a handful of routes and vehicles to thousands—are they primarily technical, regulatory, operational, or commercial?

The main bottleneck is the regulation, specifically, the length of time required to obtain an L4 driverless permit in a country. We already see cases where the public operator is getting closer to being able to pull out the drivers, and they are preparing budgets to purchase dozens of autonomous buses for their fleets during 2026 and early 2027. It’s only a matter of time. The technology is there, but much still needs to happen in the market with respect to the integration of multiple systems (e.g., connecting to ticketing, billing, control room, etc.), in order for the autonomous vehicle to be ready for full scale in prime time. I would give it around five years until the full solution becomes standard.

Imagry talks about bio-inspired, imitation-learning-based driving. As models get larger and more “world-model-like,” how does your stack evolve—do you see a path to a single generalized “AI driver,” or will vehicular autonomy always be highly domain-specific?

Read more

Delivery Robotics, Drones & AVs

• Zoox opened up its robotaxi network to public users in San Francisco, offering free rides in the SoMa, Mission and Design District neighborhoods.

• Coco Robotics is expanding its partnership with DoorDash, bringing its delivery bots to Miami, with a focus on the 3PD’s DashMart locations.

  • Coco and DoorDash first announced their nationwide partnership at Curbivore 2025 — rewatch the discussion here — and secure your tickets to Curbivore 2026.

• Waymo is expanding across California, turning on freeway driving, while expanding its service area to include more of the Bay Area and SoCal. Out of the Golden State, the Alphabet-backed AVer is also headed to Miami, Dallas, Houston, San Antonio and Orlando, followed by Baltimore, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh and St. Louis.

• Drone delivery heavyweight Zipline is expanding its healthcare logistics platform across Africa, backed by up to $150 million in new funding from the U.S. Department of State.

• Autonomous trucking startup Einride hopes to go public via SPAC, at a $1.8 billion pre-money valuation. The company may want to first clear up its lawsuit with Maersk; the two companies are clashing over a failed partnership that was meant to encompass 300 trucks.

• Serve Robotics’ Q3 results sees revenue come in at $687k.

• Tesla received its final permit, allowing it to operate a robotaxi network in Arizona.

• Uber Eats launched a new partnership with PDD stalwart Starship Robotics, launching in the U.K. by year’s end, with Europe following next year and the U.S. coming in 2027.

• Tokyo-based Turing raised ¥15.3 Billion ($98.6 million USD) for its autonomous vehicle tech-stack.

• Wing and Walmart have expanded their partnership, bringing drone deliveries to the suburbs of Atlanta.

• Uber has taken Avride’s autonomous Hyundai’s live in Dallas; the safety-driver equipped cars are now cruising across Downtown, Uptown, Turtle Creek and Deep Ellum.

Humanoids

• Andy Rubin, famed inventor of the Android operating system, is launching a stealthy robotics startup, based out of Tokyo.

• Founded by ex-Nvidia researchers, Flexion has raised $50 million to create a “brain” for new humanoids. Investors include DST Global Partners, NVentures, Redalpine, Prosus Ventures and Moonfire Ventures.

• Figure AI has been sued by an ex-employee who alleges the company’s humanoid can “fracture a human skull.”

Back of House Automation

• Sweetgreen has sold Infinite Kitchens, its automated bowl-making solution, to Wonder. The salad-slinging startup fetched $186 million for the subsidiary, while retaining the rights to continue using the tech, having once purchased it (when it was known as Spyce) for about $70M.

• Appetronix raised $10 million for high-traffic kitchen robotics, with funding coming from Jim Grote (founder of Donatos Pizza,) the Grote family and AlleyCorp.

• Kroger is shuttering three of its Ocado-powered automated fulfillment centers, located in Pleasant Prairie, WI; Frederick, MD; and Groveland, FL.

  

• Tesla Diner, the automaker’s tech-forward restaurant in Los Angeles, lost its head chef less than four months after opening. (More on the Tesla Diner here.)

• Fresh off of raising $12 million, Armstrong Robotics is debuting a new general-purpose robot for commercial kitchens and restaurants, initially going to market with a focus on dishwashing.

Farm & Sourcing Automation

• Monarch Tractors was sued by one of its dealers, which alleged that the startup’s autonomous farm machinery is “defective” and “unable to operate autonomously.”

Industry Trends

• Robot orders in North America grew in Q3, reaching 8,806 robots, with a value of $574 million, a 17.2% rise in revenue YoY.

• China’s economic-planning agency is warning the humanoid center may be experiencing a bubble, as over 150 companies race to market with similar products.

  

Kiosks & Self-Checkout

• Estonia is mulling legislation that would allow for self-service pharmacies, using kiosks to provide medical necessities to rural villages.

In Other News

Tesla hopes to begin Cybercab production in April. Sweetgreen opens Infinite Kitchen powered, drive-thru oriented Sweetlane in Costa Mesa. Russian humanoid flops on stage. Can Claude train a robotic dog? Tesla opened up its Austin robotaxi network to all iPhone users. The ethical concerns around the police use of robotic dogs. Sodexo names new North American head. LOXO begins autonomous grocery deliveries in Germany. Isuzu begins AV trucking tests in Japan. Physical Intelligence raises $600M for robotic foundation models, backers include Alphabet’s venture arm. Tutor Intelligence raises $34M for warehouse robotics. Meet the workers training new robots. Two new robotic wok restaurants have opened in LA — which one is better? MIT student’s highly-cited AI study falls apart under scrutiny.

1X became the first humanoid-maker to make their robot available to purchase by the general public. Intended for home uses like chores and cleaning, Neo is a 66-pound bot, running $20,000. Critics have been quick to note the machine is almost constantly recording its surroundings, with remote operators accomplishing almost all the tasks that might eventually be automated.

And in mega-funding news, Avride raised $375 million, via a mix of funds coming from its parent company Nebius Group, as well as outside capital from Uber. The company plans to use the capital to expand its robotaxi service to 500 vehicles. Avride also expanded its partnership with Grubhub, launching in Jersey City, the first time Grubhub has taken robots off of a college campus. (More on that story over at The Curbivore.)

Delivery Robotics, Drones & AVs

• DoorDash will deploy Waymo’s full-size robotaxis for food deliveries in Phoenix, AZ. Arizona has become a real testing grounds for the 3PD, which is also deploying its Dot robot nearby. DoorDash’s premium DashPass members will also get discounts on Waymo rides.

• Swedish autonomous trucking startup Einride expanded its partnerships with postal group PostNord and food manufacturer Mars, while competitor Waabi deepened its tie-up with Volvo.

• Starship Robotics closed on a $50 million Series C, led by Plural, with participation from Karma.vc, Latitude, Coefficient Capital, SmartCap, and Skaala. Starship plans to use the capital to begin in-city operations in the United States.

  

• Dave’s Hot Chicken pilots drone delivery in Los Angeles with Matternet.

• Beijing’s Neolix closed on $600 million in Series D financing, led by UAE-based StoneVenture, with participation by Gaocheng Capital, CITIC Capital, CDH, Sparkedge Capital, Beijing AI Fund, Legend Capital, Gaorong Ventures, and Templewater. Neolix makes an L4-capable autonomous delivery vehicle, capable of on-road driving. The startup obtained China’s first autonomous delivery license in 2021, and now works with marquee logistics brands like DiDi Freight, SF Express, JD Logistics, China Post, STO, YTO, ZTO, and J&T Express.

• China’s Apollo Go is entering Switzerland. The Baidu subsidiary will provide Level 4 autonomous vehicles for the country’s rural public transport provider, PostBus.

  

• Waymo continues its U.S. expansion, with its robotaxi service headed to San Diego, Las Vegas and Detroit.

Humanoids

• Chinese humanoid robot maker Leju Robot raises 1.5 billion CNY (approximately $207M) in pre-IPO funding.

• DEEP Robotics launched its new generation of industrial-grade humanoid robot, the DR02, featuring IP66 all-weather capabilities.

  

• Figure AI launches its 3rd-generation model, including soft goods handling, wireless charging, improved audio system for voice reasoning and battery improvements.

• Humanoid deployed human-like robots to perform bin-picking of metallic bearing rings amidst clutter, carried out in a near-production setting at manufacturer Schaeffler’s site in Germany.

Back of House Automation

• Walmart and Avery Dennison are introducing a novel RFID technology for fresh categories like meat, bakery and deli to improve inventory accuracy and reduce food waste.

  

• AutoStore unveils AutoCase, to automate the loading and unloading of full cases, combining case handling and piece-picking in one flow. Other new features include FlexBins, Frozen-Only Grid, CarouselAI enhancements, improved fire standards, and more.

• Simbe rolls out its Tally inventorying robot to 17-store grocer Harmons, in Utah.

• Brain Corp and Driveline launch ShelfOptix shelf-intelligence machines, with pilots in Winn-Dixie and Harveys Supermarket.

Farm & Sourcing Automation

• Following its acquisition of farm-ng, Bonsai Robotics rolled out the Amiga Flex, Amiga Trax and Amiga Max, for weeding, hauling materials, towing sprayers / mowers, and scouting crops.

  

Industry Trends

• Amazon scales back hiring by 600,000; will instead rely on more and more robots and “cobots.”

Kiosks & Self-Checkout

• Instacart’s smart Caper Carts are headed to Big Bunny Market in Massachusetts and Stewart’s Marketplace in Utah.

• San Francisco’s Pasta Supply Co. introduced the Bay Area’s first Italian noodle vending machine, serving tortellini and bucatini at Spark Social SF.

In Other News

SoftBank to buy ABB’s robotics business for $5.4 billion. Serve Robotics sells $100 million in new stock. Revolute Robotics raises $1.9M to deploy for drone that can fly and drive. Feds probe Waymo-school bus incident. Japanese c-stores are hiring “robots” run by Filipino workers. GM plans hands-free, eyes-free driving by 2028. Grab to collaborate with May Mobility on robotaxis. Amazon plans augmented reality glasses for delivery workers. AgiBot launches zero-code platform: LinkCraft. Kiwibot finishes rebrand to Robot.com with the launch of new hardware. Nvidia expands robotaxi ambitions with Uber, Stellantis, Lucid, Mercedes-Benz and Aurora. “TSA-like security screening” could ground drone economy ambitions. UCLA professor Bolei Zhou joins Coco Robotics. Tesla hopes to operate 1,500 note-quite-AVs by year’s end.

Join AV and robotics leaders on Wednesday 10/8 in NYC for the inaugural Urban Autonomy Summit. Limited tickets still available, apply to attend now!

Delivery Robotics, Drones & AVs

• DoorDash gets into robotics with the launch of a “smart-scale” and Dot delivery robot. Modern Delivery sat down with Ashu Rege, DoorDash’s Vice President of Autonomy, to get all the details.

  

• Uber invests in and partners with Flytrex, bringing drone delivery of Uber Eats to Texas.

• Munich-based Fernride raises €18M for autonomous logistics, with a partial pivot towards military applications.

• Uber partners with Chinese AV startup Momenta, bringing robotaxis to Germany in 2026. Meanwhile, a partnership with Avride may bring autonomous Hyundai IONIQ 5s to Dallas.

• Serve Robotics buys assets of Voysys and Phantom Auto, enhancing its teleoperations capabilities.

• Lyft partners with May Mobility to bring autonomous Toyota Siennas to Atlanta, while working with Waymo in Nashville.

• Amazon-owned Zoox opens Las Vegas-area robotaxi service to public users.

• Serve Robotics expands to Chicago, eying a market that Coco recently entered.

  Stockholm-based Einride raised $100 million for autonomous freight solutions.

• Robotic mysteries: Swiss police “arrest” RIVR’s canine-like delivery bot, while Magna unexpectedly ends its delivery bot testing in Toronto early.

Humanoids

• Chinese humanoid developer UBTECH secures $1 billion line of credit from Infinity capital to boost production.

• X Square Robot - maker of the Wall-OSS open-source foundation model and the Quanta X2 robot - closed on over $100M in Series A+ financing.

• Figure AI secured over $1 billion in capital commitments for its Series C funding round, at a $39B post-money valuation.

• Dyna Robotics closed a $120 million Series A funding round, led by Robostrategy, CRV and First Round Capital, for its general-purpose foundation model that’s set to improve robotic uptime across uses like hotels, restaurants, laundromats and gyms.

• London-based Humanoid launched the HMND 01 Alpha, a dual-armed mobile manipulator, built for industrial use.

Back of House Automation

• Red Lobster rolls out AI-powered voice ordering, in partnership with SoundHound.

• Presto teams up with ElevenLabs to add new language support for voice-powered ordering.

Industry Trends

• China installed nearly 300,000 new robots last year, more than the rest of the world combined. (Factories in the United States installed 34k.)

• VC investment in robotics is bouncing back in 2025, with deal value up 170.5% QoQ and 263.2% YoY at the close of Q2.

• European robotics funding may break records in 2025, with over €1 billion (~$1.2 billion) raised through early August.

  

Kiosks & Self-Checkout

• British supermarket Tesco trials avocado ripeness scanners, taking the squeezing and guess work out of shopping.

• Circus begins production of its fourth-generation high-volume food production robot; the CA-1 consists of over 29,000 components.

  

• Long Beach, CA — population 450k — becomes the first American city to regulate self-checkout machines, mandating at least one employee for every three kiosks.

• Amazon shutters all Amazon Fresh grocery stores in the United Kingdom, in a blow to its checkout-free ambitions.

• Target launches new self-checkout machines tailor-made for blind users.

• Alberts brings its meal vending kiosks to Therme Bucharest spa.

In Other News

Tesla seeks permits to bring ridehailing to Bay Area airports. Amazon Robotics’ ViTa-Zero solves zero-shot visuotactile challenge. Robotics startup Physical Intelligence eyes $5 billion fundraising. DoorDash tests drone deliveries in SF. Waymo extends NYC testing. Instacart Caper Carts gain new features, as they head to Morrisons and ShopRite. Kroger eyes cuts to its Ocado-powered automated fulfillment network. Bot Auto finishes uncrewed truck validation run. Waymo and SFO airport finalize “Testing and Operations Pilot Permit.” Zoox begins testing in Washington, D.C. Uber buys data labeling startup Segments.ai. Nvidia eyes $500M investment in British AV startup Wayve. Famed roboticist Rodney Brooks thinks the current humanoid funding boom is a bubble due to fundamental hardware shortcomings. Nobody asked for this: Samsung to put ads on its smart fridges.

PARTNER | Are Autonomous Vehicles Impacting Rideshare Utilization and Driver Earnings?

Autonomous vehicles were expected to make rideshare cheaper for riders and more profitable for platforms. But how are they impacting traditional rideshare driver earnings and utilization today?

The Gridwise Autonomous Vehicle Impact Report analyzes four AV-active markets against nationwide trends to uncover the early effects on driver pay and productivity:

• Hourly pay decreased YoY across all AV cities, including a –6.9% drop in San Francisco, while nationwide hourly pay rose +1.0% YoY.

• Earnings per trip rose +3.4% YoY nationwide, but fell or remained flat in every AV market — with Austin declining –5.3% YoY.

• Gross monthly pay dropped YoY in most AV cities, such as a –9.0% decline in Phoenix, even as nationwide earnings rose +8.0% YoY.

It’s still early days for autonomous vehicles, but the early data points to real pressure on drivers in AV markets.

Download the full report to get the complete picture of how AVs are reshaping rideshare.

Download Now

Delivery Robotics, Drones & AVs

• Chipotle has launched Zipotle, an aerial drone delivery pilot in Rowlett, Texas (near Dallas), partnering with Zipline to deliver full-menu orders via autonomous aircraft that gently lower meals directly to customers’ locations. Orders are placed in the Zipline app, featuring Chipotle’s entire menu of Southwestern cuisine.

  

• GoTo Foods has launched a multi-brand drone delivery pilot in Frisco, Fort Worth, and Plano, Texas, in partnership with DoorDash and drone operator Wing. Customers within roughly four miles of participating Auntie Anne’s, Jamba, McAlister’s Deli, and Schlotzsky’s locations can now receive orders via drone, with orders arriving in 20 minutes or less.

• The U.S. Department of Transportation unveiled the FAA’s long-awaited Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM) for Part 108, introducing a performance-based regulatory framework to enable routine Beyond Visual Line of Sight (BVLOS) drone operations and to replace the current case-by-case waiver system.

• Serve Robotics acquired Vayu Robotics to integrate foundation model–based autonomy and simulation-powered AI into its sidewalk delivery robots, aiming to improve navigation, safety, and expansion into new markets. The deal includes ~1.7 million shares upfront, up to 560,000 shares tied to performance milestones, and 4 million warrants issued to Khosla Ventures; Vayu’s leadership and investor Vinod Khosla are now part of Serve’s advisory board. Check out Serve and Vayu’s co-founders sharing the stage at Curbivore 2025.

• Just Eat Takeaway.com has partnered with Swiss robotics firm RIVR to pilot doorstep delivery in Zurich using wheeled-legged ground robots powered by “Physical AI,” capable of navigating stairs, curbs, and urban obstacles at speeds up to ~15 km/h, with real-time monitoring, secure handover, and full weather resilience.

• Robomart has unveiled its Level-4 autonomous delivery vehicle, the RM5, a shuttle-sized, all-electric robot with 10 climate-controlled lockers capable of carrying up to 500 lb, designed to fulfill multiple deliveries per trip and support a flat $3 delivery fee with no additional charges—launching later this year in Austin, Texas.

• Brazil’s iFood shared details on its autonomous robot ADA — developed with the Brazilian startup Synkar — featuring Physical AI, computer vision, sensors, dynamic mapping, real-time obstacle avoidance, and remote support.

  

• Nuro raised $203 million in Series E funding at a valuation of $6 billion, signaling confidence in its pivot from building delivery robots to licensing its "Nuro Driver" autonomous driving technology to automotive and mobility partners. Investors include Uber, Nvidia, and Baillie Gifford.

Humanoids

• LimX Dynamics has unveiled the LimX Oli — a 1.65 m tall, full-size humanoid robot with 31 active degrees of freedom — designed to propel embodied-intelligence R&D through its modular hardware, open SDK, and high-fidelity motion capabilities.

  

• Unitree just introduced two new robots: the R1 humanoid, priced around $5,900 with 26 joints and multimodal AI, and the A2 quadruped, capable of running at 11.2 mph, carrying heavy loads, and navigating rough terrain.

• Boston Dynamics and Toyota Research Institute (TRI) have demonstrated that the Atlas humanoid robot can execute complex, multi-step manipulation tasks—combining walking, crouching, lifting, and reacting to unexpected obstacles—under the control of a single, language-conditioned Large Behavior Model (LBM) rather than separate, hand-coded routines.

Back of House Automation

• Hyphen — makers of a closely-watched digital makeline — just secured $10 million in new funding from fast casual restaurant chain Cava.

• Taco Bell is reassessing its use of voice-AI-powered drive-thru ordering—currently live at over 500 locations—after encountering glitches, prank orders, and mixed customer reactions, prompting the company to recalibrate when and where AI should take the lead versus human intervention.

• Undaunted, Vox AI — a Dutch startup developing multilingual voice-AI platforms for quick-service restaurants — secured €7.5 million ($8.7 million USD) in seed funding—bringing its total raised to around €8.6 million—to accelerate global expansion and open a San Francisco office.

Farm & Sourcing Automation

• John Deere has completed the full acquisition of California-based GUSS Automation, integrating its autonomous sprayer systems tailored for high-value crops — such as orchards, vineyards, and specialty produce — into its precision agriculture lineup. The two companies first formed a joint venture in 2022.

Industry Trends

• With 2025 now 2/3s through, Sifted checked in on Europe’s biggest robotics fundraising hauls of the year, led by Neura Robotics, CMR Surgical and Aerones.

Kiosks & Self-Checkout

• Starting September 21, Long Beach, California, will enforce a “Safe Stores are Staffed Stores” ordinance, mandating that grocery and drug retailers dedicate at least one employee to monitor every three self-checkout stations, keep a staffed traditional checkout lane open during self-checkout hours, and cap self-checkout transactions at 15 items—aimed at reducing theft and improving customer support. Violations could result in fines of up to $2,500 per incident per hour.

In Other News

Are self-driving bins the future of trash pickup? Alibaba to spin-off its Banma AV subsidiary. Intel-spinout RealSense collaborates with NVIDIA to integrate Jetson Thor and sim platforms on depth cameras. Walmart chooses Ranpak AutoFill for new FCs. Aurora and McLeod partner on AV trucking. PrismaX debuts tele-operations platform to control robotic arms. Cyngn deploys autonomous DriveMod Tuggers at Coats. Kodiak Robotics chooses NXP for AV processors. Irvine, CA-based FieldAI raises $400M for embodied AI.

Pinkbot — the Miami and Toronto-based delivery robot startup formerly known as Tiny Mile — has quietly rolled out some big updates.

On the hardware-front, the company just released its V5 robots, updating the form-factor to house a large pizza, returning to a four-wheel configuration, and now running three times faster than before. More importantly, after 30 months of research, the machines are now licensed to drive on-road, as you can see in the video above, putting this lightly-capitalized company in the same category as behemoths like Nuro.

PARTNER | DoorDash vs. Uber Eats: The Flower Delivery Battle That Could Shape the Future of On-Demand’s Delivery

Mother’s Day. Valentine’s Day. These aren’t just big days for gifts — they’re a battleground for retail delivery dominance. For many customers, their first non-food delivery happens on a holiday. That first experience can shape loyalty for every delivery after.

The Gridwise Special Occasion Report unpacks how platform performance on key dates is revealing early leaders in the race for retail.

• Mother’s Day demand exploded: Delivery volume spiked 1,174% above baseline in 2025, up from 723% in 2024.

• Uber Eats surged on Valentine’s Day: Its market share jumped from 25% to 52% — more than doubling overnight.

• DoorDash market share declined on Mother’s Day: Market share fell from 60% to 43%, marking a significant year-over-year drop.

🔗 Get the full report and see what these seasonal shifts mean for the future of delivery.

Download Now

Market Expansion

Read more

Delivery Robotics, Drones & AVs

• Serve Robotics is partnering with Little Caesars, delivering pizza via Uber Eats in Los Angeles, with expansion into Miami, Dallas and Atlanta planned shortly. Serve’s new hardware can hold four 16-inch pizzas plus sides and drinks.

• Jetpak and Grasshopper trial cargo drones in Sweden.

• Lyft partners with China’s Baidu to bring robotaxis to Europe, aiming for a roll-out in Germany and the U.K. next year. This come hot off the heals of an earlier AV partnership with Benteler Mobility.

• Waymo hits 100 million rides across five American cities.

  

• Coco Robotics expands fleet, targets 10,000 robots nationwide.

• Jahez launches first delivery robotics operation in Saudi Arabia, in partnership with Robot.com / Kiwibot.

  • Editor’s note: guess Peykbot never pulled off that Saudi launch they had planned.

Humanoids

• Tesla Diner’s Optimus broke down on the first day of operations.

• Tesla’s overall production of Optimus is falling behind as well, with its target of 5,000 units produced by year’s end looking unlikely to be met.

• Shenzhen-based EngineAI raises $140 million for mass production of humanoids.

• KEENON Robotics debuts its first bipedal humanoid service robot: XMAN-F1.

  

• Hugging Face launches Reachy Mini robot for hobbyists and tinkerers.

Back of House Automation

• WOOHOO — an AI-powered restaurant led by “Chef Aiman” (🙄) heads to Dubai’s Burj Khalifa.

• Keenon ranks first in commercial service robotics market share.

• Chipotle invests in high-efficiency equipment, as the fast-casual chain eyes increased catering sales.

Farm & Sourcing Automation

• Bonsai Robotics acquires Farm-ng, a year and a half after the latter’s $10M Series A.

• 4AG Robotics raises $40M Canadian for autonomous mushroom harvesting.

  

Industry Trends

• New research suggests California’s $20 minimum wage for fast food workers lowered industry employment by 2.7%.

• Robotics investments on track to hit $10.4 billion in 2025, eclipsing previous three years’ annual hauls.

  

• Agtech valuations rose 59% in Q2, but deal activity fell 22.8% to $1.5 billion, across 118 deals.

Kiosks & Self-Checkout

• VenHub expands to LAX and Hollywood.

In Other News

Augmentus raises $11M Series A+ for no-code bot programming. Berkshire Grey and Kardex demo AutoStore CarouselAI. Pharm Robotics automates dairy cow healthcare. Domino’s launches Domidog delivery pup. Cartken execs explain pivots from LMD to industrial robotics. Tesla Diner’s full menu revealed, details on its customer geofencing, middling reviews. Unitree Robotics preps for IPO. Pudu launches T600 for heavy payloads. Shinkei looks to improve fishing operations.

The store itself catches the eye, a gleaming blue metal and glass box, the size of a small shopping container; they can now be caught in four locations across Greater LA, including one at LAX’s buzzy new transit hub.

But how does VenHub work as a machine, and more importantly, as a business? We kicked the tires on this contraption, and then chatted with company CEO Shahan Ohanessian.

Once you want to order something — whether it’s a bottle of iced tea or a box of Pop-Tarts — you need to first download the VenHub app, (currently languishing with 2.5 stars in the Google Play store) an annoying piece of friction that might deter your average 7-Eleven shopper.

Once you checkout, the machinery springs to life, grabbing your order and then placing it on a dedicated bay, which each shopper can then open by scanning a final QR code. (Note to VenHub: consider making these deep links, so they can have more useful behavior for potential customers.) While VenHub wouldn’t speak to their hardware choices, brand names like Universal Robotics, Vention and Robotiq are clearly visible to passersby.

PARTNER | Urban Fleets Are Getting an AI Teammate — Join for Early Access

SWITCH is launching its new Agentic AI platform – designed to optimize every layer of fleet operations, from demand forecasting to task automation. This is more than just analytics: it’s an intelligent agent that integrates directly into your tools, simulaing outcomes and acting on real-time data.

Now in Early Access, the program is free and already working with operators worldwide – from those managing a few dozen large vehicles to others running hundreds of thousands of micromobility units. Whether you’re in shared mobility, last-mile delivery, or car rental, if you manage urban fleets, this is your chance to help shape the future of AI for urban fleets.

✅ White-glove onboarding

✅ Influence the product roadmap

✅ Early access to new capabilities

👉 Apply Now for Early Access

All in all, the process worked, popping out a cold drink in just a few minutes. While you could likely beat that time in a human-powered c-store, VenHub aims to serve areas that don’t have the foot traffic to support a traditional store on a 24/7 basis.

But that begs a bigger question… why not just use a traditional vending machine? At least at this North Hollywood location, there were no items in stock that couldn’t fit in those familiar form factors, not to mention larger format machines that retailers like CVS have been experimenting with for the past decade. While the robotic arms may catch the eyes of passersby, or of those drawn to the company’s crowdfunding campaign, the jury’s still out on if the added cost and complexity makes sense in the long run.

We caught up with VenHub’s CEO to get his additional insights.

Ottomate News: How were the initial locations selected?

Shahan Ohanessian: The initial VenHub Smart Store locations were chosen based on a combination of high foot traffic, proximity to residential and commuter zones, visibility, and ease of permitting. Our team also considered power access, security, and demographic data to ensure optimal performance for early rollout success.

What can you share about the technology inside the VenHubs?

Read more

Staff on site said the facility should be open to the public “in a few weeks,” giving drivers and diners in Hollywood a 24/7 option for food, movies and dozens of EV charging stalls. As we poked around the site, the two screens appeared to be playing E.T. — a fittingly transportation-focused scifi film.

(While many publications are reporting that the restaurant will host 75-80 charging stalls, based solely on an enthusiast’s tweet, looking at the site’s permits, and doing a gut check on the lot size, suggest it will hold closer to 32.)

Many of the restaurants details are covered in retro-appropriate neon, giving it an eerie glow at night.

PARTNER | They’re Switching Between You and the Competition

Most gig workers use at least two platforms a month and some juggle three or more. If you're not offering competitive pay, flexibility, and fast cashouts, you’re just another app icon.

Get your copy of the full report to see what drives platform choice.

Download Now

Elon Musk first teased the idea of a Tesla restaurant back in 2018, but permits weren’t filed until 2023. Construction crews made quick progress, with the building’s general form being visible by February 2024. Other details have been murkier: the chefs associated with the project seemed to rotate in and out as Elon’s political views grew darker, before settling on ghost kitchen magnate Eric Greenspan.

Located at 7001 Santa Monica Boulevard, on the site of a former Shakey’s Pizza, the location will fill a rather gaping hole in Tesla’s Supercharger network, which currently has zero ports in densely populated Central Los Angeles neighborhoods like Hollywood, Koreatown and Westlake.

Comparing the current Tesla Supercharge map with how it looked two years ago, the company has otherwise made scant progress, which is perhaps unsurprising as the company fired much of its charging-focused team in April 2024.

We’ll report back with a review to see if the restaurant’s burgers are as fried as Elon’s mind after a 10-day ketamine bender...

Note to media: you are free to use these photos as long as you credit “Jonah Bliss” and link back to this post.

Speaking of tips, the Ottomate team was particularly amused by a recent encounter with a self-checkout machine at LAX airport. At the end of transaction — which was “automated” in the sense that the customer had to do all the work — the screen helpfully asked how much of a tip we’d like to add. Full disclosure: we declined.

Delivery Robotics, Drones & AVs

• Coco Robotics raised $80 million for its sidewalk delivery bots, with funding from Sam and Max Altman, Pelion Venture Partners and Offline Ventures.

• Deliveroo and Manna launch drone-based food delivery in Dublin, Ireland.

• Wingcopter partners with Ansys for aerial delivery of medical supplies.

• Cartken integrates Stirling Ultracold’s technology for transporting good at temperatures as low as -86°C (-122.8°F). Cartken also extended its partnership with Mitsubishi’s Melco Mobility Solutions.

  

• Amid middling Texas debut of robotaxi service, Tesla stages autonomous delivery of vehicle from factory to customer.

• Zoox begins manufacturing robotaxis in Haywood, CA.

Humanoids

• Tesla loses Milan Kovac, head of its robotics division, after suing a former Optimus engineer over theft of trade secrets.

• Humanoid teases its upcoming HMND 01 prototype, showing humans and machines coexisting.

• 1X Technologies releases Redwood, an AI model for its NEO humanoid.

• Germany’s Neura Robotics is raising €1 billion for humanoid tech, after showing off its new Gen3 4NE1.

• China’s Unitree raised a Series C, valuing the startup at 12 billion CNY ($1.7 billion USD.) The $97.6 million was led by China Mobile, Tencent, Alibaba, Ant Group, Geely Capital, HongShan Capital and Jinqiu Capital.

• Hexagon AB launched its AEON humanoid, specializing in auto, aerospace, transport, manufacturing, warehousing and logistics.

  

Back of House Automation

• Xrobotics raised $2.5M from FinSight Ventures, SOSV, MANA Ventures, and Republic Capital. Its $1,300 per month pizza robots currently cook 25,000 pies per month.

  

• Tokyo-based TechMagic is bringing its I-Robo2 to the United States; the machine can cook stir-fry dishes like fried noodles, pad thai and fried rice.

Farm & Sourcing Automation

• SoCal-based Shinkei Systems raised $22M for automated seafood harvesting.

• New Zealand’s Halter raised $100M for smart cow collars, enabling virtual fencing for ranchers.

Industry Trends

• Cybernetics Ventures is raising a $100M fund for robotics and automation. Based in Massachusetts, its team brings experience from the likes of iRobot, Kiva Systems/Amazon Robotics, Flagship Ventures and Locus Robotics.

• After preaching the gospel of automation and then being seemingly sacrificed at the alter, Starbucks has decided to go in the opposite direction: the coffee giant is doubling down on expanding and training its workforce.

  

• Trump administration issues executive order: Unleashing American Drone Dominance.

• NHTSA releases new guidelines to streamline AV exemptions.

Kiosks & Self-Checkout

• Appetronix debuted its new autonomous kiosks for preparing Asian and Mexican food in airports, hospitals, office towers, stadiums and universities.

  

In Other News

Miso Robotics partners with Roboworx. Amazon releases new foundation model after deploying millionth robot. BlueRedGold raises €2.73 million for robotics-powered, indoor saffron cultivation. SoftBank proposes $1 trillion robotics plant in Arizona. Dara Khosrowshahi (CEO, Uber) and Alex Kendall (CEO, Wayve) discuss autonomous vehicles. Beewise’s robotic beehives are fighting colony collapse.

Walgreens Expands Use of Robot-Powered Pharmacies

Walgreens is increasing its reliance on robotic prescription fulfillment by expanding its micro-fulfillment centers to serve over 5,000 stores by year’s end. These centers currently handle about 40% of prescriptions, aiming to reduce costs and free up pharmacists for patient care. The move is part of a broader turnaround strategy amid ongoing labor shortages and operational challenges.

Universal Robots Introduces Fastest-Ever Cobot

At the Automate Show in Detroit, Universal Robots unveiled the UR15, its fastest collaborative robot to date, capable of speeds up to 5 m/s. Designed for high-speed, high-payload applications, the UR15 integrates AI capabilities through the UR AI Accelerator, enhancing productivity and flexibility in various industrial settings.

Amazon Highlights New Human Roles Amid AI Integration

Amazon introduced "Vulcan," a robot with tactile sensing, to assist in warehouse operations. While automating certain tasks, Amazon is also retraining workers for roles in robotics maintenance, indicating a shift in human job functions rather than complete replacement by automation.

Cartwheel Robotics Develops Home-Friendly Humanoid

Cartwheel Robotics is focusing on creating humanoid robots designed for home environments. Their prototype, Yogi, emphasizes user-friendly interactions and emotional engagement, aiming to integrate seamlessly into daily domestic life. But can it cook?

Chipotle President Joins Tesla's Board

Jack Hartung, Chipotle's president and former CFO, has been appointed to Tesla's board of directors. His extensive experience in the food industry is expected to contribute to Tesla's ever-broadening ventures, including the upcoming launch of its retro-themed diner and charging station in Los Angeles.

Simbe Enhances Retail Computer Vision Technology

Simbe Robotics announced advancements to its Simbe Vision platform, improving shelf monitoring and inventory management through AI-powered computer vision. The technology offers retailers enhanced accuracy in detecting stock levels, pricing errors, and product placement issues.

Rainbow Robotics Unveils Dual-Arm Robot with Omnidirectional Wheels

Rainbow Robotics introduced a development kit featuring a dual-arm robot equipped with omnidirectional wheels. This setup allows for enhanced mobility and dexterity, catering to complex tasks in various industrial applications, and comes hot off the heels of Samsung Electronics securing a 35% ownership interest in the startup.

Donatos Pizza Launches Fully Autonomous Restaurant at Columbus Airport

Ohio’s Donatos Pizza, in collaboration with Appetronix and HMSHost, is set to open its first fully autonomous restaurant at John Glenn Columbus International Airport. The multi-machine operation will be open for business 24/7, in Terminal B’s concourse. This opening comes after Donatos and Appetronix first announced their collaboration nearly two years ago.

Next Robot Unveils Al Dente Introduces Automated Pasta Preparation

Next Robot has developed a robotic system capable of preparing pasta dishes autonomously, dubbed “Al Dente.” Launching later this year, the technology is designed to maintain consistency and can also prepare other dishes like risotto.

Unitree G1 Humanoids Compete in Robot Combat Tournament

In China, Unitree Robotics' G1 humanoid robots participated in a robot combat tournament, with four teams mechanically squaring off with different fighting styles. The “black team,” which emphasized defensive strategy over speed, was the ultimate victor.

In Other News

Kiwibot CEO Felipe Chavez talks rebranding, new products. DoorDash discontinues voice-powered ordering. Circus completes acquisition of FullyAI. Paris-based startup Veesion raised €53 million to advance its AI technology that detects shoplifting through gesture recognition. Arrive AI raises $40 million after public listing. Robotic Operating System releases Kilted Kaiju. Costco considers adding Sam’s Club-style automated checkout. U.S. Representatives reconvenes bipartisan Congressional Robotics Caucus.

Jonah Bliss: It’s been almost two years since we last checked in with the Kiwibot team – what’s new?

Felipe Chavez: It's been a busy two years! We've achieved some significant milestones, like surpassing 1,000,000 tasks and expanding our operations into new regions (like Dubai, Saudi Arabia). One of the most exciting developments has been our acquisition of Nickelytics, a move that has broadened our horizons by bringing mobile advertising into our service offerings.

And to really drive this new chapter, we've significantly strengthened our leadership team. We recently welcomed J. Kim Fennell as our new Chief Business Officer. Kim brings extensive experience, having previously served as Head of Business Development US & Canada and Global Technology Partnerships at Uber. He will be instrumental in spearheading strategic partnerships, cultivating key commercial relationships, driving corporate development, and boosting revenue growth.

The acquisition of Nickelytics brought a strong leader, Eduardo Iniguez, who is now the CFO of Kiwibot. His experience in scaling high-growth tech companies is invaluable as we integrate Nickelytics and navigate through the pre-IPO round.

Furthermore, in April 2024, Kiwibot acquired AUTO Mobility Solutions, a Taiwan-based company specializing in AI-driven self-driving and robot security chip development. This acquisition strengthens Kiwibot's commitment to cybersecurity and enhances its control over data privacy during delivery operations. AUTO's expertise in AI, IoT, and cybersecurity, along with their portfolio of over 100 patents, adds significant technological innovation to Kiwibot's offerings. This acquisition also facilitates a shift in Kiwibot's robot production supply chain from China to Taiwan.

Of course, we're also continuing to push the boundaries of what's possible with our robotic platforms. We have our new cargo robot designed for larger payloads and more diverse logistics needs, and the Kiwibot Dog, which features advanced AI for enhanced autonomy and more natural human-robot interaction.

Last, but not least, we launched a rent-a-robot service. Did you miss the promo video? Here it is!

Top of mind is your recent acquisition of Nickelytics. How did that come together?

This strategic move not only allows us to offer businesses a unique and engaging way to connect with consumers, but it also perfectly complements our existing expertise in robotics and AI.

We saw a natural synergy between our autonomous delivery platform and Nickelytics' innovative approach to out-of-home advertising. It allows us to offer businesses a unique way to reach consumers while leveraging our existing infrastructure and expertise in robotics and AI.

What’s it been like adding on an OOH advertising firm? Nickelytics sells inventory on other delivery bot brands and different types of vehicles — has that complicated things, or taught you anything unexpected?

Read more