Autonomous robots will now deliver pizza in several German and Dutch cities, thanks to a partnership between Domino’s Pizza Enterprises and Starship Technologies.
Starship have built a fleet of autonomous robots, monitored by humans, which are designed to deliver goods locally in 15-30 minutes within a 2 mile radius. According to Domino’s CEO Don Meij, the new partnership will be an “important next step in bringing robot pizza deliveries to reality”.
The Starship robots will begin by delivering pizzas within a 1 mile radius around Domino’s stores in selected German and Dutch cities. Domino’s Robotic Unit (DRU) will oversee the partnership, after testing both ground and air based delivery solutions in 2016.
“We’re shared in our vision with Domino’s to constantly improve convenience for the customer,” said Ahti Heinla, Chief Executive Officer at Starship Technologies.
“Not only is Domino’s pizza delicious, but the perfect topping is giving back the luxury of time and control to the customer, and our robots are best placed to offer this.”
Domino’s Pizza Enterprises is the largest franchisee of the Domino’s Pizza brand in the world, completing hundreds of thousands of deliveries every day from more than 2000 stores across the Company’s seven markets.
Don Meij, Domino’s Group CEO and Managing Director, said:
“We are a global company and we are eager to progress innovative technology in all of the countries in which we operate – we are very excited to be partnering with Starship as it brings regular deliveries by robot one step closer to commercial operations.
“Robotic delivery units will complement our existing delivery methods, including cars, scooters and e-bikes, ensuring our customers can get the hottest, freshest-made pizza delivered directly to them, wherever they are.
“With our growth plans over the next five to 10 years, we simply won’t have enough delivery drivers if we do not look to add to our fleet through initiatives such as this.”
Starship Technologies was started by two Skype co-founders, Ahti Heinla and Janus Friis, and recently announced $17.2 million worth of seed funding, led by Mercedes-Benz Vans.
Domino’s have often used technology to accelerate sales, with several campaigns including by tweeting a pizza emoji to @dominos, or requesting delivery from drivers of the Domino’s DXP “ultimate pizza delivery vehicle,” a modified Chevy Spark.