Subway commuters in Shenzhen, China, may soon need to make room for a fleet of chunky, snack-carrying delivery robots.

Earlier this week, more than three dozen autonomous, four-wheeled delivery robots boarded and exited active subway trains, and eventually delivered packages to several 7-Eleven convenience stores. Although this demonstration was only a preliminary test and took place during off-peak hours, the company behind the subway-riding robots believes they could soon help stock shelves at around 100 7-Eleven locations. The initiative is part of a broader effort in China and other countries to normalize the presence of delivery robots operating in public spaces.

The test run, first reported by the South China Morning Post, featured 41 robots developed by a subsidiary of Vanke, a large Chinese firm partly owned by the Shenzhen Metro. A video demonstration shared by the company shows the roughly three-foot-tall, stocky bots lining up at a subway stop. They wait for human passengers to exit the subway car before rolling onboard. Once they reach their stop, the robots exit the car and drive themselves to an elevator, which is remotely activated. 

After exiting, each robot rolls up to a storefront, where a human worker unlocks its boxy body and retrieves the goods stored inside. In this case, the video shows a worker unloading what appears to be a carton of tea. Each robot also features an LED screen “face” that lights up with cartoonish eyes and smiles.

Vanke claims its robots do all this by using a combination of robotics and AI planning. The machines are equipped with panoramic lidar—similar to the technology used in driverless cars—to “see” the world around them. A specially designed chassis system, which Vanke likens to a “skeleton and motor nerves,” enables the robots to make minor autonomous adjustments when boarding subway cars or elevators. The entire delivery process is managed by an AI-based dispatching system that handles scheduling and determines optimal delivery routes. This planning system accounts for multiple variables like delivery requirements, cargo type, and subway capacity to develop the most efficient routes.

All of this, Vanke claims, is in service of simplifying and speeding up logistics for shops in metro systems, which ordinarily rely on human drivers above ground that can face delays due to limited parking and congestion. Shenzhen’s subway system is massive. It has more than 300 stations spread out across the megacity, many featuring their own shops and convenience stores. 

“In the past, store goods could only be delivered to subway stations via ground transportation,” a convenience store manager participating in the trial reportedly said in a translated statement. “Not only was it difficult to park on the ground, but the process of transporting goods from the ground to the store often encountered the subway’s morning rush hour, resulting in high delivery time and labor costs.

7-Eleven did not immediately respond to Popular Science’s request for comment. 

The subway-riding robots are part of a citywide initiative in Shenzhen called the Embodied Intelligent Robot Action Plan, which aims to accelerate the adoption of robotics across multiple industries by 2027. More broadly, the Chinese government has been pushing in recent years to normalize the presence of robots in public spaces. In April, about 20 bipedal robots raced alongside humans in what was dubbed the world’s first “humanoid robot half marathon.” (Only four of the machines completed the race—most tripped, veered off course, or broke down in clouds of smoke.) More recently, Chinese robotics company Unitree livestreamed what it claimed was the world’s first boxing match between humanoid robots.

Similar efforts to introduce robots into public areas in the US have often been met with less-than-stellar reception. Last year, the New York Police Department officially retired a roaming egg-shaped security bot that patrolled subway stations following backlash from commuters and privacy advocates. Smaller-sized food delivery robots from companies like Starship are already bringing take-out to hungry students at around 39 universities, though their rollout has been marred by some robots getting lost, falling in ditches, and struggling to cross streets. Amazon is even reportedly developing AI-trained robots to one day jump out of vans and deliver packages.

But if the untimely demise of hitchBOT—a hitchhiking robot that was beheaded by vandals in Philadelphia—is any indication, people may still need a bit more time to learn how to coexist with humanoid machines in public spaces. 

 

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