Foodora tests drone and robot deliveries in Sweden

Mobile app

The Starship Robot platform, over the five-month operating period to 30 May 2024, delivered 150,000 orders to households. Working off S-Market’s dedicated home delivery mobile app, the service had linked to an initial 100 S-Market grocery stores by the end of November.

The platform currently serves 14 towns and cities across

Finland
, including

Helsinki
,

Tampere
and
Espoo
. S-Group is estimating full-year 2024 deliveries exceeding 400,000 homes.

Additionally, S-Market is recording downloads of over 20,000 per month for the home delivery app, said Tiina Meyer, a senior business developer of retail ecommerce at S-Group.  

“The robot delivery service is a major retailing innovation boosting our grocery business,” she said. “Because of its convenience, it’s hugely popular. Customers appreciate the convenience of this new technology, the speed at which their orders are processed and delivered, the aesthetically pleasing robots, and especially enjoy the music the robots play upon delivery.”

Starship Technologies was incorporated in 2014 by Janus Friis and Ahti Heinla, the two Estonian co-founders of Skype. Headquartered in

San Francisco
, the company operates engineering subsidiaries in

Tallinn
and
Helsinki
.

Foodora’s pilot trials of the ground delivery Doora in
Sweden
include specific tests related to how the robot navigates pedestrian crossings and curbs, as well as how the robot recognises its surroundings and communicates.

Test and evaluation

The Doora and Foodora Air projects will help to test and evaluate the full potential of the delivery systems when connected to Tele2’s 5G network and IoT technology, said Stefan Trampus, the executive vice-president of Tele2 B2B.

“Within this project, we will be able to use the robot delivery concept to look at other industries and areas of use,” he said. “We can track how GPS and IoT function, and look to optimise solutions. The 5G IoT technology is essential for the drones’ smooth operation. The target is to achieve rapid response times and substantial data transfer capabilities to ensure safe delivery management.”

The Doora ground robot is designed to transport food and other products up to a maximum weight of 20kg. The delivery robot has a top speed of 6km (3.72 miles) per hour and a battery life of eight hours, with a four-hour charge.

The Foodora Air project’s core focus is on testing the operability of a fleet of battery-powered drones, utilising 5G technology provided by Tele2, to deliver meals from various restaurants located in the
Stockholm
suburb of Värmdö. The Nimbi drones, developed by Swedish firm Aerit, are integrated into Foodora Air’s technology platform.

The all-weather certified Nimbi drones used by Foodora Air are able to operate within a maximum delivery range of 21km and emit 2g of carbon dioxide per kilometre. The Nimbi has a maximum payload carrying capacity of 4kg (10lb), and features a proprietary winching system that enables package pick-up and drop-off without the need for supporting infrastructure.

As part of the Foodora Air trial, deliveries are being restricted to customers’ properties, including front and back gardens where packages can be safely lowered by cable from airborne drones.

The results, and shared test data, emanating from the Doora robot and Foodora Air trials in

Sweden
will help to shape how the company rolls out drone and robot-supported delivery services in
Norway
, said Søegaard. “We are closely following the tests in
Sweden
and hope to learn from that experience,” he said. “The data we collect from the project and trials will better inform us about the challenges we face in
Norway
and need to overcome and solve.”

Foodora has opened a dialogue with public and private players to expand robot delivery services across
Norway . The first significant hurdle will be to obtain authorisation from the Norwegian Public Roads Administration (Statens Vegvesen), and local municipalities, ahead of launching autonomous robots, and at a later stage, drones, in Norway.

Foodora is hoping to roll out a robot delivery service in Norway during the first half of 2025, in collaboration with Danish autonomous air and ground vehicle firm Holo.

In August, Holo partnered with Foodora

Norway
to conduct a demonstration test at Fornebu, a suburb of
Oslo , using a six-wheeled delivery robot supplied by California-based Cartken. The Cartken robot is equipped with three 5G modems and connectivity to multiple mobile operators to ensure continuous communication to shield against signal drop-off. The Cartken uses a PIN code system enabling customers to unlock and retrieve food and other deliveries.

Holo also collaborated with
Posten
,

Norway
’s state-controlled postal service, on a pilot trial to test electric-powered delivery robot Ottobot. The robot was supplied by New York-based Ottonomy.IO. The test, which was conducted in the
Oslo
district of Filipstadkaia in November and December 2022, has so far not resulted in a decision by Postern to procure delivery robot units for commercial use.  

The Ottobot pilot test was run as a partnership project with AMOI,
Norway
’s largest digital marketplace that connects specialist retailers, including restaurants, with customers ordering home delivery.

Posten has been something of a trailblazer in
Norway
as regards the testing of ground robot delivery systems. In 2018, the company conducted a pilot trial in
Oslo
on the Buddy Mobility autonomous parcel delivery robot. However, high operating costs and low demand for the service resulted in Posten shuttering the project in 2019.