Pipedream, an autonomous underground rail system that offers near-instantaneous delivery of objects to and from homes and businesses, announced that it has raised $13 million in funding. This funding round was led by Starship Ventures, with participation from Cortado Ventures, Myelin Ventures, and many other angels and firms.
Pipedream Labs CEO Garrett McCurrach said that this funding round will be used to speed up the delivery of Instant Pickup to customers and to start construction on the first large-scale middle mile network in a city.
In the past year, Pipedream successfully built an almost mile-long in-city test network that delivers goods from inside a retail store to inside an office building nearly a mile away through an underground pipe.
This year, Pipedream will select a city to build our first middle-mile network (a large-scale underground delivery network that makes current deliveries faster and cheaper in a city) and collaborate with local governments to maximize the benefits of the company’s low-cost and fast delivery system for all their citizens. Construction is set to start this year and plans to start utilizing the network by next spring.
KEY QUOTES:
“Our long-term goal is to make hyperlogistics a reality by the end of this decade. Hyperlogistics is achieved when people in a city can receive things in under 10 minutes for less than a dollar and send back that item just as easily as it was received. To do this, we need to make moving goods around a city and through buildings, as easy and painless as it is to move water.”
“Instant Pickup takes all the modules designed for our in city network, and helps businesses automated curbside with a system that is low-cost and easy to retrofit into existing buildings. Instant Pickup allows employees at a grocery store, restaurant, or retail store load orders into a back-of-house storage system so that when a customer pulls up to one of our kiosks in the parking lot, their order can be handed to them in less than 15 seconds, much faster and easier than drive thru.”
“We currently have over 100 preorders for Instant Pickup systems and will use this capital to scale deliveries to our partners as quickly as possible. We are excited to work with our quick-service restaurant (QSR), retail, and grocery partners to help them make getting their products to customers faster and easier.”
- Pipedream Labs CEO Garrett McCurrach
