San Francisco Business Times/Alisha Green: Exclusive: Postmates is the first company to apply to use delivery robots in San Francisco under new rules

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Exclusive: Postmates is the first company to apply to use delivery robots in San Francisco under new rules

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By Alisha Green  – Reporter, San Francisco Business Times
Jul 6, 2018, 2:21pm PDT

On-demand food and grocery delivery service Postmates is the first company to apply for a permit to test and operate robot couriers on San Francisco sidewalks.

At least one company, San Francisco-based Marble, used delivery robots on city sidewalks until the San Francisco Board of Supervisors passed legislation in December requiring a permit to continue operating. The Department of Public Works rules resulting from that legislation were finalized last month. Postmates completed its application the following day, June 19, according to a document reviewed by the San Francisco Business Times.

Postmates applied for a permit to test and operate three “autonomous delivery devices” on San Francisco sidewalks, the maximum number allowed per company under the new city rules.

The objective is to learn how to safely use the sidewalk robots and interact with pedestrians, merchants and customers, Postmates wrote in its application. Postmates did not respond to multiple requests for comment about its application and its plans if it receives approval.

Postmates has already been testing delivery robots in cities including Washington, D.C., and Redwood City. The San Francisco-based company has raised some $278 million in funding, according to Crunchbase, with the most recent infusion being a mega round of $141 million in November 2016.

Postmates might not be alone for long in its quest for bringing robots to the city sidewalks, though. Marble plans to apply for a permit in the next few weeks, the company’s Director of Communications and Government Relations Jackie Erickson told the Business Times.

That could offer Marble a path back to partnerships it landed last year with Eat24 and DoorDash to make deliveries around parts of San Francisco. Since it had to remove its robots from San Francisco sidewalks after December's legislation, Marble has continued testing in Concord and is "pursuing opportunities in other cities," Erickson said.

Another local robot company, Starship, will sit out the city’s pilot program. Starship recently moved its global headquarters from London to San Francisco and hired an Airbnb executive as its new CEO. It does not plan to apply for a permit to operate its courier robots in the city, a spokesperson told the Business Times.

If Postmates’ application is approved, its robots could ferry various meals and goods from San Francisco restaurants and grocery stores to customers. The company did not specify whom the manufacturer of their robots would be, though Postmates does use Starship robots for deliveries in Washington, D.C. Postmates wrote in its application that the robots it would use in San Francisco would weigh around 100 pounds, travel up to 3 miles per hour, and could carry up to 50 pounds of goods. The robots would be 28 inches long, 22 inches wide, and 28 inches tall. A human operator would be present within 30 feet of each robot "to ensure safety of the operation," Postmates wrote.

Under the San Francisco pilot program, testing will be limited to areas zoned as Production, Design and Repair that are not within a “high-injury corridor.” That leaves around 761 blocks in the city for testing, according to Public Works. Postmates would limit its testing area to spots around Florida Street, 7th Street, Division Street, and 16th Street, according to its application.

The city capped the number of sidewalk robots at a total of nine for the duration of the pilot program. The pilot comes after a proposal that would have banned the sidewalk robots due to concerns about pedestrian safety. Marble and the San Francisco Chamber of Commerce pushed back on that proposal from Supervisor Norman Yee, asking instead for rules that would allow continued operations while addressing safety concerns.

The back-and-forth has parallels to the scooter debate in recent months, where the city ordered all electric, stand-up scooters be removed from city sidewalks so it could start a pilot program that would limit their use. A dozen companies applied for the five available permits to rent out scooters.
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