Delivery robot startup Starship Technologies has signed a major deal with Estonia-based Bolt Technologies OU to deliver food in multiple countries.
Bolt is an Uber competitor "super app" that offers a variety of services such as ride sharing and food delivery with 100 million customers mostly in Europe, but with some operations in Africa and Latin America.
Starship's robots are expected to begin deliveries at some point this year. The company says it has already completed 5 million deliveries with its fleet of small sidewalk-roving robots, and the size of its fleet currently numbers at above 2,000.
It operates mainly on U.S. college campuses, but the company recently expanded to the U.K. to service deliveries in seven cities and multiple university campuses.
"Bolt is in more than 500 cities so this partnership unlocks all of those cities for Starship robots, which will be thousands of robots in addition to the current fleet of 2,000," a Starship spokesperson said. "Initially, the partnership will likely launch in Tallinn, Estonia, which is where both companies were founded. The partnership will expand well beyond that, but the other cities haven’t yet been determined."
As the company sets its sights on Europe, it appears to be pulling back on local operations. Last year the company laid off 11% of its staff and scaled back deliveries in towns like Mountain View and Pleasanton.
Starship was founded in 2014 by Estonian entrepreneurs Janus Friis and Ahti Heinla, who also founded Skype. The company has raised $128.2 million to date and is backed by TDK Ventures and Morpheus Ventures.
