7-Eleven, Inc is partnering with Nuro, a robotics company transforming local commerce with autonomous vehicles, to offer the first commercial autonomous delivery service in California, beginning with customers in the Mountain View community, who can now use the 7NOW delivery app to choose to have their products delivered via an AV or delivery ‘bot’.
Initially, the delivery service will use Nuro’s autonomous Priuses, until the introduction of Nuro’s autonomous R2 robots, which are custom-built to transport products and goods without any occupants in the vehicle. Nuro became the first autonomous vehicle company to receive a deployment permit from the California DMV in December 2020, enabling the launch of this inaugural commercial delivery service in the state in collaboration with 7-Eleven.
Age-restricted items (alcohol, tobacco products, lottery tickets) will not be available for autonomous delivery; and all of Nuro’s Priuses will include an autonomous vehicle operator in the driver seat to monitor the technology and ensure an optimal delivery experience as the service is introduced in the Mountain View area.
“7-Eleven has owned and defined convenience since 1927,” said Raghu Mahadevan, 7-Eleven chief digital officer. “Our first foray into autonomous delivery was in 2016 when 7-Eleven became the first retailer in the US to make a drone delivery to a customer’s house. Since then, we haven’t stopped looking for ways to redefine convenience for our customers inside and outside the four walls of our stores. Fast forward to 2021, and we are pushing the boundaries of innovation even further to provide customers with the first commercial autonomous delivery service in California. I can’t wait to see where we go from here.”
“Residents in the state of California – a major hub of innovation – have never been able to experience the commercial delivery of goods by an autonomous vehicle. Nuro is teaming up with 7-Eleven to change that,” added Jiajun Zhu, Nuro CEO and co-founder. “We’ve always wanted to bring Nuro’s autonomous delivery to our local community and to our neighbors. We couldn’t be more excited to do this with an iconic neighborhood store like 7-Eleven in our hometown, Mountain View.”