When delivery robots enter public spaces: A longitudinal study of Starship robots in Stockholm

Drive Sweden project funded by Sweden's Innovation Agency Vinnova
(May 2025 – May 2027; grant no. 2025-00420)

How does society adapt to a new transport technology in the form of autonomous delivery robots?

Team

Researchers

Hannah Pelikan (PI)
Department of Culture and Society, Linköping University, Sweden
Stuart Reeves (Subcontracting partner, Linköping University)
School of Computer Science, University of Nottingham, UK
Daniel Rudmark (Co-PI),
Cilli Sobiech (Senior Researcher),
Niklas Arvidsson (Senior Researcher),
VTI, Swedish National Road and Transport Research Institute

Partners

Starship Technologies
City of Stockholm
Transportstyrelsen, Swedish Transport Agency
Urban Robotics Foundation

What this project is about

The project follows the first deployment of a fleet of delivery robots in Sweden. We use empirical evidence in the form of video recordings of the behaviour of people who encounter the robots and interviews with people on the street to inform policies for the deployment of autonomous public delivery robots in Sweden, and the development of standards for public mobile robots globally.

The project will deepen our understanding of:

how the robots and their operations integrate with local communities
how the robots impact and are impacted by the behaviour of people who encounter them on the street

From these trials, we will:

develop policy implications
prepare a larger implementation project building on these first deployments

A photo of a Starship robot on the streets of Stockholm, Sweden — A delivery robot fleet on the streets of Stockholm, Sweden

Project publications, activities, and other outputs

Over the lifetime of the project we have so far conducted research on public robots, published academic and industry white papers, and engaged with external organisations.

WHITE PAPER Hannah Pelikan, Daniel Rudmark, Cilli Sobiech, Niklas Arvidsson, Stuart Reeves and Bern Grush. Autonomous Delivery Robots in Dense Urban Environments: Stockholm's First Unaccompanied Fleet Deployment (PDF). Presented at HRI 2026 Industry Day.
PUBLICATION Simon Ekman, Joachim Örtegren, Kacper Mateusz Sieklucki, Raymond Tchou, Ludwig Halvorsen, and Hannah Pelikan. Sharing Public Space with Robots: Following a Fleet of Delivery Robots on City Sidewalks (PDF). In Companion Proc. HRI 2026.
RADIO INTERVIEW Sveriges Radio P1 Vetenskapspodden Aug 30th 2025, "Därför kan vi få vänta på matroboten – människornas trafikbeteenden för svåra att läsa" with Hannah Pelikan and Christian Smith (KTH), host Lena Nordlund.

Student work related to this project

Karin Stendahl: Exploring the societal value of delivery robots [Master thesis]
Simon Ekman: Designing legible robot motion [Bachelor thesis]
Kacper Mateusz Sieklucki: Pedestrian perspectives on robot fleet deployments [Bachelor thesis]