Students at Stonehill College will soon be sharing the sidewalks with a futuristic food delivery service.
The Easton-based college is partnering with Kiwibot to bring its food delivery robots to campus. Starting this week, Stonehill College will have 15 robots operating on campus and delivering food prepared by Roche Commons Dining, Au Bon Pain and The Hill.
California-based Kiwibot has already established its robots on Massachusetts college campuses, including Framingham State University, Endicott College, Curry College and Merrimack College. Natalia Gutierrez, an executive manager at Kiwibot, said the company is still operating at these universities.
Kiwibot was founded in 2017 and had its first pilot at the University of California, Berkeley campus.
Kiwibot uses an app created by Sodexo, a facilities management and food services company, for students and staff to place orders. The app, called Everyday, allows students to order their food, select a drop-off location, track the delivery robot and open the correct robot’s lid to get their food. Gutierrez said deliveries take about 25 minutes.
The robotics company began partnering with Sodexo in 2021 to expand its services to college campuses. Kiwibot announced a multimillion-dollar contract expansion with Sodexo last year. Gutierrez said universities partner with Sodexo because of its dining services, and then Sodexo helps bring Kiwibot onto interested campuses.
“They have been like our teachers in a lot of ways because they supported us opening in campuses for the first time. And now we’re going to work also with Grubhub, but it’s because of how much we have learned with Sodexo,” Gutierrez said.
In December, Grubhub said that it would be bringing Kiwibot’s services to more colleges, starting with the University of North Dakota.
Kiwibot has targeted student campuses because their technology works best when it has fewer streets to cross. Gutierrez said the robots use data from sensors and AI to avoid obstacles as they roll down the sidewalk. But to cross the street, which Gutierrez said is considered a “high-risk moment,” the robots require remote supervision from a real person.
Gutierrez said the robots should have little trouble working in the extreme weather conditions in the Northeast. The robots can operate in negative temperatures and come with jackets to wear during inclement weather. The robots can also carry up to 25 pounds.
Should the robots run into any issues, Gutierrez said there will be an operations team on campus to help with maintenance and to recharge the robots’ batteries.
The robots will operate at Stonehill on Monday through Friday from 9 a.m. – 5 p.m. Kiwibot will offer different memberships, as well as delivery without a membership with a $2 delivery fee plus a service fee of 10% of the total order.
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