FedEx terminates Roxo, the same-day delivery robot
By Rob Moore, Daily Memphian
Published: October 12, 2022 10:31 AM CT
Richard DiPasquale, a member of the FedEx SameDay Bot test team, checks systems on Roxo before starting a test run at the FedExForum on Sept.4, 2019. FedEx is ending the project. (Jim Weber/The Daily Memphian)Less than four years after launching Roxo, the same-day delivery bot, FedEx is ending the project.
Roxo, developed in collaboration with DEKA Research & Development Corp., was designed to create a reliable, autonomous last-mile delivery robot that could deliver to a customer’s door, including climbing the curb, traveling up the sidewalk and climbing deep terrace steps.
The company is stepping back from the research and development program for a same-day bot as it prioritizes several nearer-term opportunities, FedEx said in a statement.
“We are immensely proud of our role in working with DEKA to advance this cutting-edge technology that has put it on the path to future implementation, and we remain committed to exploring last mile innovations that align with our business strategy,” according to the statement.“The collaboration with DEKA has been outstanding, and we will continue to explore compelling opportunities arising from the technologies we have developed together.”
In late 2019, FedEx began a two-week trial run for Roxo in Memphis, where the bot
met Memphis Mayor Jim Strickland at City Hall.
Roxo was also the special guest in April when FedEx Logistics opened its
$50 million global headquarters at the former Gibson Guitar factory Downtown.
“All of us need to see that you have a change in the labor environment,” FedEx Logistics president and CEO Udo Lange said in April. “So it’s not that robots are competing with labor. Robots are just enhancing the overall workforce. You will find areas where robots add the most value.”
Despite the end of the Roxo program, which completed trials in select cities in the U.S. and abroad, FedEx is still working on pilot programs for other forms of autonomous delivery, including a pilot program with California-based Aurora Innovation Inc. to test autonomous driving technology.
.