Starship Technologies to expand its university delivery service
Starship Technologies, the autonomous restaurant and grocery delivery service, has announced that it has raised $40 million in Series A funding.
The company, which has just become the first to complete 100,000 commercial deliveries, also announced that it plans to expand its service to 100 university campuses in the next 24 months.
Delivery robots arrived this week at the University of Pittsburgh. Purdue University, Indiana is launching on 9 September with more following shortly.
With the closing of this Series A funding round, Starship has now raised a total of $85 million. The company will use the new funding to rapidly expand its services to more university campuses. The round was led by Morpheus Ventures with participation from prior investors including Shasta Ventures, Matrix Partners, MetaPlanet Holdings and others, as well as new investors including TDK Ventures, Qu Ventures and others.
“We’ve evaluated the autonomous tech market segment around the world, and Starship is miles ahead of others in bringing advanced technology valued by real paying customers,” said Nicolas Sauvage, Managing Director of TDK Ventures. “Starship’s machine learning, computer vision, and sensor fusion is the most advanced we’ve seen in autonomous robotic delivery. We look forward to contributing to the success of Starship in this important and emerging space.”
“This new investment will see Starship expand onto more campuses as we head towards a goal of offering our service to over one million students,” said Lex Bayer, CEO of Starship Technologies. “An entire generation of university students are growing up in a world where they expect to receive a delivery from a robot after a few taps on their smartphone. The reception to our service both on campuses and in neighbourhoods has been phenomenal. Our customers appreciate how we make their lives easier and give them back the gift of time.”
