Communications of the ACM
A Toaster on Wheels to Deliver Groceries? Self-Driving Tech Tests Practical ses
This week, two small self-driving cars will start chugging along at no faster than 25 miles an hour to deliver groceries in Scottsdale, AZ.
Credit: Caitlin O'Hara/The New York Times
Slow uptake of driverless passenger services is spurring the autonomous industry to experiment with offerings like food deliveries from small, self-driving vehicles.
One example is an unmanned electric car from the Nuro startup that transports groceries from a local chain to customers in Scottsdale, AZ.
Nuro's Dave Ferguson said, "If we can reduce the cost of these deliveries and get them to you faster than you could make the trip yourself, there would be no reason for you to get in the car."
More recently, Postmates in San Francisco announced plans to dispatch robotic shopping carts with blinking digital eyes onto sidewalks for similar deliveries.
Ferguson said Nuro can increase the margin of error on roads by making the delivery vehicle much smaller than a normal-sized car.
From The New York Times
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