More supermarket delivery robots to take to streets in Cambridgeshire

More supermarket delivery robots will be taking to the streets in a pilot village in Cambridgeshire.

The robots said they used energy equivalent to that needed for a kettle to boil a cup of water in an average delivery journey.

The pilot for Cambridgeshire will see households be able to order from the Co-op in Mosquito Road in Upper Cambourne and wait for their delivery.

If the project is successful, Starship will use more suppliers and expand across the county, the council said.

According to Alex Beckett, chairman of the council's highways and transport committee, the venture has the potential to make life easier for thousands of people while also reducing congestion. It said its robots were powered by zero carbon electricity and were advanced autonomous devices that could carry items over short distances without needing a driver.

They use a combination of sensors, artificial intelligence and machine learning to travel on pavements and navigate around obstacles, while computer vision-based navigation helps them map their environment to the nearest inch.

Andrew Curtis, UK operations manager at Starship Technologies, said the robots were a key part of its strategy to expand its e-commerce offer, as he said it had received extremely positive feedback from people using the service in Milton Keynes and Northampton.