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Most delivery automation stops at the curb. But for Veho<\/a> and Zurich-based robotics startup Rivr, the real challenge \u2014 and opportunity \u2014 lies in those final 100 yards from van to doorstep.\u00a0<\/p>\n In a pilot program launching Tuesday in Austin, Rivr\u2019s four-wheeled, stair-climbing delivery robot, which CEO and founder Marko Bjelonic describes as \u201ca dog on roller skates,\u201d will ferry packages from Veho\u2019s vans directly to customers\u2019 front doors.\u00a0<\/p>\n The companies are starting small, they told TechCrunch exclusively. Just one highly supervised robot will work daily, making five- to six-hour runs over the span of a couple weeks throughout Austin. But both companies see it as a critical step toward solving a unique slice of the end-to-end autonomous delivery journey.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n Bjelonic says in last-mile delivery, \u201crobotics makes an impact by actually solving these very challenging problems that are actually quite easy for humans but hard for robots. And we see [Rivr] as a differentiator, almost as the next evolutionary step from the sidewalk robots.\u201d<\/p>\n The partnership with Veho also gives Rivr an opportunity to both test its technology and accumulate data necessary to build a general physical AI framework.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cWhat we have seen in the robotic space is that there\u2019s a data barrier, because ChatGPT and other chatbots have the internet as training data, and autonomous cars have thousands of cars on the street that they can attach sensors to and start collecting data,\u201d Bjelonic told TechCrunch. \u201cBut in the robotics world, that kind of dataset is missing, so you need to find the meaningful use case where you can solve a real problem, and then you can start collecting all of the data to make these robots more intelligent.\u201d<\/p>\n For Veho, which delivers across 50 U.S. markets for brands like Sephora, Saks, HelloFresh, and more, this partnership is a chance to test what automation looks like from the van to the customer\u2019s door. That could eventually allow for more deliveries to take place at once, particularly in dense urban areas where both the driver and the robot can tag-team a particular street simultaneously. Bjelonic says Rivr\u2019s \u201crobot helpers\u201d can also \u201creduce the workload on these drivers\u201d by taking over the physically demanding task of walking door to door.<\/p>\n During the Austin trial, a Rivr employee will accompany the bot to ensure safety and delivery quality. Bjelonic told TechCrunch the bots can operate autonomously, but remote operators will be able to tap in if they get stuck.\u00a0<\/p>\n The Austin pilot will start in the more residential area of Northwest Austin before expanding to denser areas of town, according to Fred Cook, Veho\u2019s co-founder and CTO. In the future, Cook says he could imagine pairing the vehicles with certain types of vehicles with charging stations for the bots to keep them going for a full day of work.\u00a0<\/p>\n Rivr hopes to use the learnings from its partnership with Veho to scale to 100 bots by next year and thousands in 2027. The startup is currently operating in the U.K. through a partnership with delivery platform Evri. Rivr has raised more than $25 million, including from a Jeff Bezos-led round that valued the company at $100 million<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/div>\n