Uber Eats and Starship to Launch Autonomous Sidewalk Robot Delivery in December

Uber Technologies and Starship Technologies plan to begin rolling out autonomous sidewalk robot delivery for Uber Eats by the end of the year.

The companies plan to launch this offering in Leeds, United Kingdom, in December, and then expand it to several European countries in 2026 and the United States in 2027, they said in a Thursday (Nov. 20) press release.

This new partnership brings together Uber’s mobility and delivery platform and Starship’s autonomous delivery platform, according to the release.

It will enable Uber Eats to use Starship’s artificial intelligence-powered robots to complete deliveries in under 30 minutes for distances of up to two miles, the release said.

“Autonomous delivery is an exciting part of how we see the future of Uber Eats,” Sarfraz Maredia, global head of autonomous at Uber, said in the release. “Together with Starship, we’re bringing this future to life across multiple continents, levering Uber’s global scale and Starship’s proven autonomy to deliver efficient and affordable experiences for consumers and merchants everywhere.”

Starship was founded in 2014, per the release. Since that time, its autonomous delivery fleet has grown to include 2,700 robots and has completed more than 9 million deliveries across seven countries. The company plans to scale its fleet to include more than 12,000 robots by 2027.

“Together, we’re building the infrastructure that will define the next generation of urban logistics,” Ahti Heinla, co-founder and CEO of Starship Technologies, said in the release, speaking of the collaboration with Uber. “Uber Eats has built the world’s leading delivery platform, with the widest reach, trusted by millions across 10,000 cities. We bring scalable autonomous technology that works profitably at city scale.”

When announcing in April that it had surpassed 8 million deliveries, Starship said its sidewalk robots were operating across multiple countries and U.S. university campuses.

The company said in October that it raised $50 million in a Series C funding round to add American urban markets to the campuses and the European cities in which is currently offers deliveries.

Taavet Hinrikus, partner at Plural, which led the funding round, said at the time in a press release: “Starship has quietly built the most successful autonomous technology company in the world. They’re already deployed, already profitable, and already changing how goods move through cities.”