Nuro Partners with Kroger to Launch World's First Driverless Delivery Service for the General Public | Gaorong Ventures News
After extensive testing, Nuro's autonomous delivery vehicles will begin serving residents in Scottsdale, Arizona.
Founded in 2016 by Jiajun Zhu and Dave Ferguson, both former lead engineers on Google's self-driving team, Nuro has assembled talent from Google, Waymo, Apple, Uber, Twitter, and other tech companies across research, engineering, and product — tackling some of the most challenging problems in autonomous driving and robotics. After unveiling its Level 4 fully autonomous delivery vehicle in January 2018, Nuro today announced a partnership with Kroger to launch the world's first autonomous vehicle delivery service available to the general public.
Gaorong Ventures led Nuro's first Series A funding round. From the start, Gaorong sensed Nuro's pure, relentless drive to accelerate how robotics could bring convenience to people's lives. The company pushes the industry forward with cutting-edge technology, engineering rigor, product excellence, and commercial thinking.
On December 18, 2018, Silicon Valley autonomous driving company Nuro and Kroger, the world's largest grocery chain, announced the launch of the world's first autonomous vehicle delivery service for the general public.
Since August, Nuro and Kroger had been running a pilot of autonomous delivery services in Scottsdale, Arizona, using a fleet of autonomous Toyota Priuses with safety operators on board, completing roughly one thousand deliveries to date. The service launching today is fully driverless — Nuro's autonomous fleet will gradually add the R1, a custom-built unmanned delivery vehicle designed and manufactured by Nuro. The R1 operating on public roads will have no driver, no passengers — only cargo.
Nuro President and Co-founder Dave Ferguson recalled: "Eleven years ago, I had the privilege of competing in the DARPA Urban Challenge. In the final round, eleven teams sent their autonomous vehicles into a temporary city built from scratch. It was the first time self-driving cars had operated in real, unrehearsed traffic conditions. Both my co-founder Jiajun and I were fortunate to join Google's self-driving car project early on. In 2015, the Google team conducted its first driverless ride on public roads. Since then, the industry has taken enormous strides toward bringing autonomous technology to the world."
"We founded Nuro two years and four months ago, hoping to accelerate how robotics could bring convenience to everyone's lives. Nuro envisions a world where anything can reach customers on demand, more affordably and efficiently. Today's launch is an important step toward that goal. To our knowledge, this is the first commercial autonomous service ever offered to the general public." said Dave Ferguson.
Nuro began developing the R1 in 2016 and established its partnership with Kroger in June of this year. The technical team has been actively preparing the R1 for the autonomous delivery pilot. Hardware, software, product, operations — every team collaborated closely to redesign and rebuild the R1. Nuro made comprehensive improvements, from cargo bay design to vehicle shape to sensor placement and configuration. The unchanging goal: to build the best possible vehicle and service for goods transportation.
The best vehicle also means it must be exceptionally safe. The R1 features world-class autonomous driving software and sensor hardware, redundant critical systems, and a lighter, more compact, and more nimble form factor than standard automobiles. During this initial commercial launch phase, rigorously trained Nuro robot operators will monitor the R1 and be able to take control at any time.
Kroger, Nuro's partner in this autonomous delivery service, operates 2,800 stores across 35 U.S. states. Driverless delivery represents an excellent way to expand customer adoption of online grocery shopping and delivery.
"Kroger customers are looking for new, convenient ways to access everyday essentials and quickly purchase the products they need through services like pickup and delivery," said Yael Cosset, Kroger's Chief Digital Officer. "Over the past few months, our autonomous delivery pilot with Nuro has further demonstrated the advantages of flexible, reliable technology. Through this exciting, innovative partnership, we are delivering an outstanding user experience and advancing Kroger's commitment to redefining the grocery experience by creating an ecosystem that can provide anything, anytime, anywhere for our customers."
Service Details:
Location: Fry's Food Stores, 7770 East McDowell Road, Scottsdale, AZ
Hours: Orders available immediately, delivery seven days a week
How to order: Through frysfood.com or the Fry's Food Stores app
Vehicles: Nuro's autonomous vehicles can schedule same-day or next-day delivery of grocery orders — currently the custom-built driverless R1 and autonomous Toyota Priuses
Price: Flat fee of $5.95, no minimum order required
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