South Korean food-delivery app Baemin has launched outdoor delivery robots at the multipurpose housing complex Gwanggyo Alley Way, South Korea.
Called ‘Dilly Drive’, Baemin’s delivery robot delivers food from nearby restaurants to the ground floor of customers’ residences. Orders can be made via Baemin apps by scanning QR codes placed in apartments or on outdoor tables.
Once orders are placed, Dilly Drive will depart their station and head to restaurants to pick up the food orders and deliver to the ground floor of the building or an outdoor table in the plaza. Customers can monitor the whole delivery process via the Baemin app.
According to the company, Dilly Drive can move at a speed of a person walking and carry about six lunch boxes or 12 cups of beverages per delivery. The robot was carefully tested on different road surfaces and travel routes in the complex.
“Outdoor delivery robot service includes a lot more obstacles that interrupt the robot’s drive, such as the road surface, obstacles, the weather, unexpected events, and so on,” said Joseph Kim, head of robot business development at Woowa Brothers. “It can be commercialised when sophisticated technology and service know-how come together.”
The robots are expected to be able to deliver all the way to to customers’ apartment doors in the first half of next year.
Meanwhile, in Japan, Yamato Holdings and Japan Post will begin testing delivery robots on streets in Tokyo next month in a move aimed at promoting unmanned delivery technology, which has already taken off in the US and China, according to the Nikkei Asian Review.
