Technology
Avride’s sidewalk robots are set to commence delivering restaurant meals and groceries in central Tokyo this week, thanks to a collaboration with e-commerce giant Rakuten, marking the latest business expansion by the Yandex spinoff into Northeast Asia.
The Austin-based autonomous vehicle startup is one of four initiatives under Nebius Team, a Netherlands-based firm formerly known as Yandex NV that divested its Russian operations in 2024 for around $5.2 billion.
Since then, Avride has advanced its autonomous vehicle technology growth thru its sidewalk robots and self-driving cars. It has made meaningful progress by forming partnerships with prominent companies like Uber and now Japan’s Rakuten.
Avride operates a small commercial sidewalk delivery service in Seoul, South Korea, while also testing its autonomous vehicles — which still have human safety drivers present. Last year,the company began navigating the lengthy certification process in Japan to expand its presence in the region. Now that certification is complete, Avride is initiating commercial activities within the country.The Japanese launch will be modest at first — just ten robots initially, with plans for future growth.
meanwhile, Avride is also expanding within the United States. Currently, it operates approximately 100 sidewalk delivery bots at Ohio State University through a partnership with Grubhub.
Last year saw Avride secure an agreement with uber covering both sidewalk delivery bots and autonomous vehicles. This multi-year contract forms part of a series of partnerships related to autonomous vehicles that Uber has established over recent months.
Currently , customers using Uber Eats in downtown Austin , Dallas , and Jersey City can receive their meals via one of Avride’s robots. The companies plan to integrateAvride self-driving cars into the Uber platform in Dallas later this year .
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