Robot dance

I may not have worked on an actual robot, but my interest nevertheless remains. Thus, I pay particular attention to news stories about robotics companies, especially those with offices in the Bay Area. I especially perk up when I learn that the company has offices — or even its headquarters — in Redwood City. This happens more often than you might expect, but then again, as I’ve learned, Redwood City has hidden depths.

For a time, it was hard not to notice the robots from Starship Technologies, Inc. Although the company was (and still is) based in San Francisco, back in 2016 they chose Redwood City as a place in which to do their real-world testing. For two to three years a number of Starship’s rolling robotic “ice chests” roamed the streets and sidewalks of downtown Redwood City, most being trailed by a human monitor watching to see how well the robot dealt with pedestrians, traffic and unexpected situations.

After a couple of years serving as a test bed, in 2019 the Redwood City Council approved a two-year pilot program enabling up to three companies to operate delivery robots within city limits. Starship, naturally, was on tap to be one of those companies. It had planned to deliver groceries from Dehoff’s Key Market and food from nearby restaurants to homes within the Central, Palm Park, Roosevelt and Woodside Plaza neighborhoods, and had hoped to use their robots to transport books between the downtown branch of the Redwood City library and senior and homebound residents living in the vicinity. This would have been managed out of an “operations hub” that, for a brief time, was apparently located in the remodeled liquor store space at the corner of El Camino Real and Whipple Avenue in Redwood City. About that time, however, Starship decided to shift its focus to more specialized environments such as universities, and ceased their operations in Redwood City. This new focus seems to have had some success: some years ago, while visiting the campus of Northern Arizona University (my alma mater), I found the place crawling with Starship robots, delivering food to students and faculty on demand.

Starship may have been the most visible of the robotics companies with ties to Redwood City, but it was by no means the only one. Years ago, I ran across Mayfield Robotics, who back then was operating out of a building next to the Lexus dealership on Convention Way. Mayfield Robotics was developing “Kuri,” a cute little home-based robot that was intended to be a combination smart assistant and roaming security camera. Unfortunately, Mayfield shut down in late 2018, and Kuri never came to market.

One company that has done better is Chowbotics, a company building “robots for food service.” For a couple of years Chowbotics operated out of a building just west of the 7-Eleven store on Broadway in Redwood City. Chowbotics remains in business, though it is now headquartered in Hayward, and now, apparently, as a part of DoorDash.

Most recently, I learned about another local company working to develop a food-service robot: Bear Robotics. Bear Robotics lists two headquarters locations on its website: Addison, Texas, and Redwood City. In Redwood City, at least, it operates out of a rather nondescript building on East Bayshore Road, just below Seaport Boulevard. While I have yet to see any of its products in operation, according to its website, Bear Robotics produces a robot called Servi that is in use in a number of restaurants throughout the country — including some Denny’s restaurants — so perhaps I will see one soon. Servi is designed to help serve food and bus tables, so in any restaurant where they are operating the robots should be quite visible.

Robots continue to fascinate me, although, I have yet to buy as much as a robot vacuum cleaner. While companies large and small in the business of developing robots can be found in many parts of the country, I’m delighted that, in the world of robotics, Redwood City is playing a part. Now, if only I needed a serving robot.

Greg Wilson is the creator of Walking Redwood City, a blog inspired by his walks throughout Redwood City and adjacent communities. He can be reached at greg@walkingRedwoodCity.com. Follow Greg on Twitter @walkingRWC.