Ahti Heinla is the Co-Founder and CEO at Starship Technologies. Previously, he was one of the founders and developers of Skype. He joins Natalie on the podcast to discuss the rise of autonomous delivery and the future of grocery e-commerce.

They explore:

• Skype’s legacy in transforming modern global communications.
• The future of grocery delivery: drones in the sky and robots on the ground?
• The economics of autonomous delivery: just how cost-effective is it for retailers to deliver by robot?
• Are robots the most sustainable form of last-mile delivery?
• Following on from Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s recent encounter with a Starship robot, what kind of regulatory change would Ahti like to see in the UK?
• The opportunities for humanoid robots: does Ahti agree with Elon Musk that robots will be babysitting our kids in the future?!

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More on Ahti:

In 2013, Ahti Heinla designed a sample retrieval robot to compete in a NASA contest for Mars missions. Armed with that experience, Ahti and his co-founder Janus Friis, realized there was a huge opportunity to disrupt a delivery industry which has yet to be revolutionized by technology. They set to work creating a last-mile robotic delivery solution, which is when Starship Technologies was born. Founded in 2014, Starship now operates in more than 100 service areas worldwide, and its robots have completed more than 8 million deliveries. The company has headquarters in Tallinn, in Ahti’s native Estonia.