Uber has entered a new deal to offer customers in select cities an option for self-driving vehicles. The partnership is with Avride, which used to be the self-driving unit for Russian conglomerate Yandex. The multi-year deal will begin by introducing Avride's self-driving robots as a delivery option for Uber Eats orders in Austin, Texas. Later this year, the robots are expected to become available for delivery orders in Dallas and Jersey City, New Jersey. Autonomous driving is slated to begin service for Uber ride requests in Dallas in 2025. It will only be an option for "qualifying orders" on either Uber or Uber Eats, but the company didn't specify what those qualifications are.

Uber Eats Japan on Wednesday began using self-driving robots for deliveries in Tokyo, a new venture aimed at making the service more efficient amid the country's ongoing labor shortage. The robots are currently used for two stores -- Tonkatsu Aoki and Benihana Annex -- in Tokyo's Nihonbashi area, but the company hopes to roll them out in more areas. They are being used for deliveries between 10 a.m. and 5 p.m. on weekdays. Japan is now the second country in the world where Uber Eats, the food delivery service of ride-hailing company Uber Technologies, operates delivery robots. The company began using them in the United States in 2022.

Uber may be looking to replace some human drivers with robots after facing court battles from workers seeking pay raises. The ride-hailing giant is employing self-driving robots to deliver food items for its UberEats from select merchants in Miami, Florida and is set to expand into more cities next year. The sidewalk-traveling, six-wheeled robots are from Cartken, which former Google engineers founded, and feature a trunk capable of carrying up to 24 pounds of cargo. The partnership, announced Thursday, comes two days after a Manhattan judge granted Uber's bid to temporarily block a pay hike for ride-share drivers from going into effect next week. The pay raise would have increased by 23.93 percent per mile. Uber is said to take about 25 percent commission from drivers.

SEONGNAM, SOUTH KOREA--At the new headquarters of South Korea's largest internet company, a fleet of self-driving robots whirl around delivering coffee, lunchboxes and mailed packages. More than 100 of these autonomous robots, which look a bit like the droid R2-D2 from the "Star Wars" films and go by the name "Rookie," are operational at Naver high-rise office building. The tower is specifically designed with bump-free flooring and handle-free doors that open via sensors to help the robots move around more easily. Powering the robots is a critical technology: a private 5G network that gives them a stable connection to the cloud, or virtual server, where their computing takes place, and where each unit's learned intelligence is stored and shared. Having the hardware for this in the cloud keeps the robots small and less expensive to build, key requirements for broader adoption.

Panasonic Corp. said Monday it will start trials in February of home deliveries by a self-driving robot in a residential area in Kanagawa Prefecture as the coronavirus pandemic has raised demand for services with reduced or no human-to-human contact. Panasonic plans to test the feasibility of the delivery service using an autonomous robot that can travel at a maximum speed of 4 kilometers per hour with items for delivery loaded inside. Developed by the Osaka-based firm, the small robot will be used in an area designed to showcase advanced technologies under a joint project with local authorities and other firms. Self-driving robots have gained renewed attention amid the global coronavirus pandemic, which has raised the need for some people to avoid human-to-human contact and stay at home. The virus outbreak has led more people to shop online and have food and other items delivered to their homes, but a labor shortage in a range of industries including parcel delivery has been an issue in Japan.

A self-driving robot is being trialled in a Ford manufacturing plant in Spain that can overcome obstructions and carry cargo. The robot, similar in appearance to the Wall-E trash-crushing robot from Pixar, has been nicknamed'Survival' and was developed by Ford's own engineers. It uses Light Detection and Ranging (LiDAR) technology to visualise its surroundings and guides itself autonomously. Survival's body includes an automated shelf with 17 drawers of different sizes that holds various materials and tools. A self-driving robot'Survival' (pictured) is being trialled in a Ford manufacturing plant in Spain to overcome obstructions and move cargo around Its makers say that the robot is designed to work alongside human employees and not replace them.

The online shopping giant says it started to test self-driving robots in Snohomish County, Washington, Wednesday that can bring Amazon packages to shoppers' doorsteps. The robots are light blue, about the size of a Labrador, have six wheels and the Amazon smile logo stamped on its side, according to Amazon photos .

Forget vending machines, PepsiCo is testing a way to bring snacks directly to college students. The firm says it will start making deliveries with self-driving robots at the University of the Pacific in Stockton, California. Students will be able to order Baked Lay's, SunChips or Bubly sparkling water on an app, and then meet the six-wheeled robot at more than 50 locations on campus. The Snackbots: PepsiCo says it will start making snack deliveries with the robots on Thursday. Students will be able to order Baked Lay's, SunChips or Bubly sparkling water on an app, and then meet the six-wheeled robot at more than 50 locations on campus.

Interaction between robots moving through public spaces and guide dogs for the blind and visually impaired will need to be an element of future training for service animals, according to a research project being undertaken by Starship Technologies, which runs an autonomous delivery service using self-driving robots, and UK charity Guide Dogs. Over the past few months, a series of tests conducted in Milton Keynes – where the service was officially launched in November 2018 – have been exploring the impact of autonomous technology and working animals. In the UK, guide dogs undergo rigorous training that enables them to steer their human partner through their daily life and, crucially, public spaces. Among other things, they are trained to walk centrally along pavements, to avoid obstacles, to not turn corners unless told, to stop at kerbs and steps, to judge height and width, to navigate traffic, to guide their human partners across roads, and to find doors, crossings and places that are visited often. Because of the always-on nature of a working guide dog, interaction between the animals and sighted people is strongly discouraged.

Hermes has announced a new trial for self-driving delivery robots in the UK. The autonomous machines, which have a top speed of 4mph, are 55cm tall and 70cm long, and weigh 18kg. They can carry up to 10kg at a time, with packages stored inside a secure compartment that can be unlocked with a code sent to the customer's phone. The I.F.O. is fuelled by eight electric engines, which is able to push the flying object to an estimated top speed of about 120mph. The giant human-like robot bears a striking resemblance to the military robots starring in the movie'Avatar' and is claimed as a world first by its creators from a South Korean robotic company Waseda University's saxophonist robot WAS-5, developed by professor Atsuo Takanishi and Kaptain Rock playing one string light saber guitar perform jam session A man looks at an exhibit entitled'Mimus' a giant industrial robot which has been reprogrammed to interact with humans during a photocall at the new Design Museum in South Kensington, London Electrification Guru Dr. Wolfgang Ziebart talks about the electric Jaguar I-PACE concept SUV before it was unveiled before the Los Angeles Auto Show in Los Angeles, California, U.S The Jaguar I-PACE Concept car is the start of a new era for Jaguar.