Starship Technologies

Starship Technologies is a company developing small self-driving robotic delivery vehicles. The company is headquartered in San Francisco, California, with engineering operations in Tallinn, Estonia, and a satellite team in Helsinki, Finland.[1] Starship also has offices in London, UK, Germany, Washington, DC and Mountain View, California.[2]

Starship Technologies
IndustryRobotics
Logistics
FoundedJune 11, 2014 (2014-06-11) in Tallinn, Estonia
FoundersJanus Friis
Ahti Heinla
Headquarters
San Francisco
,
United States
Areas served
United States
United Kingdom
Germany
Estonia
Key people
Lex Bayer (CEO)
Ahti Heinla (CTO)
ProductsDelivery robots
ServicesLast mile delivery
Websitewww.starship.xyz

History
A man and a Starship Technologies delivery robot waiting at a pedestrian crossing in Redwood City, California

Starship Technologies was founded by Skype co-founders Janus Friis and Ahti Heinla.[3] Initially, it was called Project Echo.[1] A core team of the company became the team Kuukulgur, which led by Ahti Heinla had participated in NASA Centennial Challenge by building experimental sample retrieval robots.[1] Starship Technologies OÜ was registered on 11 June 2014 in Tallinn, Estonia.[4] Starship Technologies, Inc., a Delaware corporation, was registered in San Francisco, United States, on 28 September 2016.[5]

Starship Technologies launched pilot services in 2016, in the US and the UK among other countries, with commercial services launched in 2017.[6] In April 2018, Starship launched its autonomous delivery service in Milton Keynes, United Kingdom, in partnership with Co-op and Tesco.[7] In March 2020, Starship became the first robot delivery service to operate in a British town centre with the rollout of its service in Milton Keynes.[8]

In January 2019, Starship partnered with Sodexo to launch robot food delivery services at George Mason University. With a fleet of 25 robots at launch, this was the largest implementation of autonomous robot food delivery services on a university campus that time.[9][10] In 2019, it expanded its services to Northern Arizona University in Flagstaff, Purdue University in West Lafayette, University of Pittsburgh, University of Wisconsin in Madison, University of Houston, and University of Texas at Dallas.[11]

In 2020, Starship expanded operations to the University of Mississippi and Bowling Green State University.[12][13][14] In March 2020, it launched its service in Washington DC's Broad Branch Market.[15]

In March 2020 following the COVID-19 pandemic, Starship made a large number of redundancies. The company did not publish how many of 260 employees in Estonia it had dismissed.[16]

Operations
A close up of a Starship delivery robot operating in the winter, with its camera array visible

Starship develops and operates the last mile delivery robots. The electric-powered robots ride on sidewalks at a pedestrian speed, with a max speed of 6 kilometres per hour (3.7 mph), can be remote-controlled if autonomous operation fails, and will only be used for relatively short-range local delivery.[6] The robots use feature detection of edges and mapping techniques to determine the suitability of navigable terrain.[17] The robot weighs 55 pounds (25 kg) unloaded, and can hold up to 20 pounds (9.1 kg) of deliveries.[18] The robots are equipped with a sensor suite that includes cameras, GPS inertial measurement unit, ultrasonic sensors, radar, and possibly also other sensors but notably no lidar.[19] The robots have speakers, so they can communicate with humans they meet.

The service has been tested in over 100 cities and 20 countries around the world.[20] The company operates in the United States, the United Kingdom, Germany, and Estonia. It has announced plans to expand its service to 100 university campuses in the United States, with the goal of reaching one million students.[21][22]

Corporate issues

The Starship's original headquarters were established in London but were moved to San Francisco in 2018.[23] Its engineering operations are located in Tallinn, Estonia, with a satellite team in Helsinki, Finland.[1]

Since 2018, the chief executive officer of Starship is Lex Bayer.[23][24] Ahti Heinla acts as the chief technology officer of the company.[24] In 2014–2018, Allan Martinson served as the chief operating officer of Starship.[1]

Starship has won US$85 million seed funding.[21][22] In addition to Janus Friis and Ahti Heinla also Airbnb cofounder Nathan Blecharczyk, Skype founding engineer Jaan Tallinn, Morpheus Ventures, Shasta Ventures, Matrix Partners, MetaPlanet Holdings, Daimler AG, Grishin Robotics, ZX Ventures, and Playfair Capital have invested into the company, among others.[22][24][25]

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gollark: Also, Minecraft has a bizarre and complex loading process.
gollark: Again, static methods.
gollark: The names are mostly replaced with random names, aren't they? Since it's obfuscated.
gollark: You don't have the original names, or comments.

See also
  • Nuro, a similar autonomous delivery vehicle, though larger at the size of a tiny car, and driving on the road.

References
  1. "Allan Martinson: the perfect storm for Estonian startups". Enterprise Estonia. December 2018. Retrieved 13 June 2020.
  2. "About Us". Starship Technologies. 2016. Retrieved 30 August 2016.
  3. Sawers, Paul (31 October 2018). "Starship Technologies launches commercial package delivery service using autonomous robots". VentureBeat. Retrieved 13 June 2020.
  4. "Starship Technologies OÜ". e-Krediidiinfo (in Estonian). Retrieved 13 June 2020.
  5. "Statement and Designation by Foreign Corporation. Starship Technologies, Inc". Alex Padilla, California Secretary of State. Retrieved 13 June 2020.
  6. Kottasova, Ivana (3 November 2015). "Forget drones, here come delivery robots". CNN Business. Retrieved 14 June 2020.
  7. Farrell, Steve (1 April 2019). "Co-op expands robot deliveries to second store". The Grocer. Retrieved 14 June 2020.
  8. Ingham, Lucy (16 March 2020). "Robot delivery service comes to first UK town centre". Verdict. Retrieved 14 June 2020.
  9. "World's Largest Fleet of Delivery Robots on a University Campus Launched by Sodexo and Starship Technologies" (Press release). Sodexo. 22 January 2019. Retrieved 1 April 2019.
  10. Clark, Mary Lee (22 January 2019). "There are robots on campus—here's what you need to know". George Mason University. Retrieved 1 April 2019.
  11. Repko, Melissa (6 January 2020). "On University of Texas at Dallas' growing campus, meal-delivering robots make splashy debut". The Dallas Morning News. Retrieved 8 January 2020.
  12. Dewitt, Emily (6 February 2020). "New Food Delivery Robots Generally Well Accepted After First Week". HottyToddy.com. Retrieved 6 March 2020.
  13. Bratton, Michael (20 February 2020). "Robots roam BGSU as part of incoming food delivery service". 13 ABC. Retrieved 21 February 2020.
  14. "'Hello, I'm a Starship Delivery Robot' — BGSU starts autonomous service". Sentinel-Tribune. 20 February 2020. Retrieved 21 February 2020.
  15. Brunner, Rob (27 March 2020). "Delivery Robots Come to DC's Broad Branch Market". Washingtonian. Retrieved 14 June 2020.
  16. "Starship Technologies makes redundancies to 'streamline service'". ERR. 28 March 2020. Retrieved 13 June 2020.
  17. Dormehl, Luke (26 February 2020). "Inside the mind of an autonomous delivery robot". Digital Trends. Retrieved 6 March 2020.
  18. "Starship at BGSU". BGSU. Retrieved 7 March 2020.
  19. "Meet UCI's Newest Employees: The Starship Food Delivery Robots". New University. 4 March 2020. Retrieved 6 March 2020.
  20. Hawkins, Andrew J. (20 August 2019). "Thousands of autonomous delivery robots are about to descend on US college campuses". The Verge. Retrieved 6 March 2020.
  21. "Starship Technologies plans campus expansion after $40 million funding win". ERR. 21 August 2019. Retrieved 14 June 2020.
  22. Hamilton, Isobel Asher (20 August 2019). "Starship Technologies, which builds cute robots to deliver bananas to lazy students, has raised another $40 million". Business Insider. Retrieved 14 June 2020.
  23. Green, Alisha (7 June 2018). "Why robot maker Starship Tech beamed its HQ down from London to San Francisco". San Francisco Business Times. Retrieved 13 June 2020.
  24. Hamilton, Isobel Asher (7 June 2018). "Robot delivery firm Starship Technologies has hired an Airbnb veteran as its new CEO and raised $25 million". Business Insider. Retrieved 14 June 2020.
  25. Shead, Sam (12 January 2017). "Robot delivery company Starship Technologies raised $17.2 million in a round led by Daimler". Business Insider. Retrieved 14 June 2020.
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