Segway recently initiated a partnership with delivery robot company, Coco. Through the collaboration, the companies plan to develop 1,000 partially automated and remotely piloted sidewalk robots.
The New Hampshire-based Segway will work alongside L.A.-based Coco to transition to robotic delivery services after years of manufacturing electric scooters and shared micro mobility operators, Segway VP of global business development, Tony Ho explains. DriveU.auto’s teleoperation and connectivity platform will contribute to the production.
The sidewalk robots are scheduled to hit the market in L.A and two other U.S. locations during the current financial quarter, Techcrunch reports. The products will be added to the L.A-based company’s existing fleet of 100 Coco robots, as well as 1,200 units projected to deploy in May or June of this year, according to the company’s SVP of vehicles, Sahil Sharma.
Segway will take on the greater part of production, while Coco will serve as an operator, Ho said.
"It’s a bit similar to the micromobility space where we provide the vehicles and hardware and they provide the relationship with the city and the staff and the whole operation behind it,” Ho told TechCrunch. “Right now, we’re seeing this almost like it was with scooters in 2017, where the whole industry is booming."
The market for autonomous delivery robots is projected to reach $236.59 million by 2027, Techcrunch reports. A $43 million fund raised by the company will be used to cover its collaboration with Coco, much of which was garnered in August through a $36 million Series A grant. Similarly, major competitors, such as Starship Technologies, have raised over $100 million, while giants like Nuro raised $600 million.
The companies confirmed that the autonomic delivery robots will feature a simpler design that will be more efficient and reliable, have fewer breakdowns, lower upfront cost and be pedestrian-friendly.
“We can learn from the fleet what the most efficient segments are, because we care about every second of the delivery, so we try to map the city to create the most efficient routes, which takes into account connectivity, sidewalk infrastructure, pedestrian traffic, car traffic,” Zach Rash, co-founder and CEO of Coco, said. “We learn a lot from the whole fleet. It’s not just about autonomous. We collect all this information to make sure that we can navigate the city as efficiently as possible.”