Avride was a nobody until it recently tied up with Grubhub. Avride brands itself as a leading developer in autonomous driving technology, specializing in autonomous vehicles and in the delivery robot industry.
“Our ambition doesn’t stop at passenger transportation services. We are continuously leveraging our team’s talent and innovation to develop delivery robots that promise to redefine the logistics industry,” the company said on its official website.
Based in Texas and founded in 2017, Avride has already made about 200,000 deliveries across five nations. This startup was previously part of the self-driving division of Yandex, a Russian company. However, it separated from Yandex last year, following corporate restructuring.
Autonomous cars are self-driving cars, otherwise known as driverless cars, robotaxis, robotic cars, or robocars. They are capable of operating with reduced or no human input. Imagine when Batman enabled auto-pilot in his Batplane in the “Batman” trilogy movie.
Do these make autonomous cars dangerous? Not really. In fact, they are offering big help for the ridesharing community.
On Thursday, Avride announced its newest partnership with Grubhub to deploy its robots with the platform’s vehicles.
The test market: college campuses in the United States.
“Campuses are almost ideal environments for introducing automation in delivery. They are relatively small areas, with a high density of orders, that is where robots shine the most right now,” Dmitry Polishchuk, the CEO of Avride, told the media.
This partnership aims to resolve the issues of labor shortages, as well as to cut costs, and reduce the dependence on traditional cars for deliveries, which will just add traffic on the road.
Media reports are saying that Avride’s first fleet of 100 robots is now active at Ohio State University. More robots will be introduced from other startups, such as Cartken. The company will also introduce its next-generation models to this partnership. The two firms will also try to capture the market Avride has, which is beyond the United States, as it is also present in Asia, such as South Korea.
There have also been developments from both sides. Avride and its affiliates, such as Serve Robotics, have strong partnerships with ride-hailing and food delivery startups to commercialize food deliveries partly run by robots.
Companies such as Avride and Serve Robotics have been cementing partnerships with ride-hailing and delivery startups to commercialize robotic food delivery.
Last October, Avride expressed its interest in partnering with Uber and its Uber Eats, also providing them with robotaxi services.
In October, Avride said it would partner with Uber and its delivery unit for food deliveries and robotaxi services. While its planned partnership with Uber has successfully been announced, it hasn’t fully materialized yet.