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IPFS News Link • Robots and Artificial Intelligence

Domino's pizzas now delivered with autonomous cars in Houston

• https://www.cnet.com, Sean Szymkowski

Other companies may soak up more of the limelight, but Nuro's been a quiet, busy bee. In fact, Nuro's R2 self-driving car is the only vehicle to receive an exemption from the US Department of Transportation to operate despite having no human controls. Now, this robo pod is getting in on the pizza delivery business.

Domino's and Nuro announced Monday that the latter's autonomous car will report for pizza delivery duty this week. It's only for customers in the vicinity of a single pizza shop in the Houston area, but still -- this is wild. On certain days and in blocked-out periods of time, customers can request their pizza for delivery via a Nuro R2 if they place a prepaid order online. Domino's will select a customer at random to carry out the delivery order, and the customer will receive text message notifications saying where the little robocar is. They'll also get a PIN that'll let them access their order when it arrives. No pizza thievery allowed, guys.

Once the R2 pulls up to the destination, the customer enters the PIN on the touchscreen and the doors retract to reveal the food inside.

Nuro actually announced this program all the way back in 2019 and said it planned to work with Domino's to use its latest R2 self-driving car. Back then, it was still working with what it called the R1. With the R2 roadworthy in the US these days, the program's ready to roll. Nuro also partnered with Kroger to deliver groceries from select stores in Arizona in the past, so it's got experience.


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