Delivery robots

For the past year, Uber-backed Serve Robotics' wheeled robots have been delivering food to customers in the Los Angeles area. The firm has now announced that up to 2,000 of the bots are set to enter use with Uber Eats in other North American cities.

A special version of Goodyear's airless tire has been fitted to six-wheeled delivery robots at Ohio's Bowling Green State University campus in order to test factors such as tread wear, braking performance and vibration damping.

We've recently heard about several urban delivery robots which would move along city sidewalks on four wheels. The Mighty bot brings something new to the mix, however, with pivoting wheels that are mounted on articulated legs.

Kawasaki has shoehorned the supercharged 1,000cc engine from its wild H2R hyperbike into a heavy-lift autonomous cargo helicopter, and has now demonstrated a robotic system for loading and unloading it without exposing humans to those big blades.

Although some people are starting to venture back into air travel, the more that they can continue physical distancing, the better. A new robotic in-airport food delivery service has been introduced in order to help them do so.

The ANYmal robot was already impressive back when it walked on four legs. It got more interesting when wheels were added, letting it both walk and roll. That wheeled version is now also able to stand up, and could soon be used for urban deliveries.

Amazon is understandably keen to make the job of deliveries easier. The latest idea is a new patent for a system where delivery vans would carry items almost to their destination, then send out and direct ground drones to do the final drop-off.

Nuro has entered an agreement with logistics giant FedEx, which has committed to using the startup's autonomous vehicle for last-mile deliveries in the long-term and at a "large scale."

Almost three years after revealing its autonomous delivery vehicle, Nuro is about to start commercial operations in California. Initially, service needs will be met by fully autonomous Prius vehicles, but the R2 delivery pods won't be far behind.

As a recent study indicated, aerial delivery drones aren't always as energy-efficient as ground-based transport. We may therefore be seeing more wheeled delivery robots, such as the rather cool-looking and increasingly in-demand REV-1.

In a significant step forward for the autonomous vehicle industry, the US Department of Transport (DOT) has granted its first ever self-driving vehicle exemption to startup Nuro, meaning its autonomous delivery pod can now push ahead on public roads.

After first revealing its autonomous electric delivery pod in January last year, robotics startup Nuro has now teamed up with Walmart for grocery delivery by self-driving pod in the Houston metro area.