But is a tip required?
Self-driving delivery vehicles powered by artificial intelligence are the latest robotic technology that could soon be on the roads in your neighborhood, even as other self-driving car makers face scrutiny over the dangers of their vehicles.
Technology company Vayu Robotics has entered the fray with a sky-blue Volkswagen mini-van-like machine that can travel at up to 20 miles per hour while carrying loads of up to 100 pounds.
High-tech delivery robot hits the market: Vayu Robotics
An unnamed “major e-commerce company” has signed a deal to deploy 2,500 of the six-foot-long “Vayu One” robots, a former Apple and Lyft executive announced on Tuesday.
A video demonstration of the self-driving device shows a store employee restocking a blue robot, which then follows the employee down the aisles, avoiding potholes, crosswalks and other obstacles before delivering the groceries to the customer’s home.
Vayu One is powered by cutting edge technology. Vayu Robotics
Occasionally, as Vayu One’s mechanical arm moves off the side of the cargo road, a side door opens.
The big draw of this technology is that its AI models are reportedly good enough to eliminate the need for the industry-common “Light Detection and Ranging” (LiDAR) to pre-map the Earth’s surface and texture.
According to the company, Vayu One “drives autonomously without pre-mapping the roads it will travel on.”
The robot “can navigate stores and streets, and even drop off packages in driveways and at doorsteps,” the company said.
Vayu One utilizes new technology that is not available from competitors. Vayu Robotics
CEO Anand Gopalan said the new technology provided answers to problems that have “plagued” the development of delivery robots for more than a decade.
Now, he said, companies can “finally create solutions that can actually be deployed at scale and get goods anywhere cheaply.”
