The in-house Scout program seemed like a no-brainer. Few companies will gain more from a successful sidewalk delivery. The program is being put on hold by Amazon.
According to Amazon, the company isn't killing the robot completely, but is scaling back the program. 400 humans were working on the program and this is a big blow. It's not clear how small the team will be.
A person for the company is talking.
During our limited field test for Scout, we worked to create a unique delivery experience, but learned through feedback that there were aspects of the program that weren’t meeting customers’ needs. As a result, we are ending our field tests and reorienting the program. We are working with employees during this transition, matching them to open roles that best fit their experience and skills.
The retail giant quietly acquired Dispatch two years prior to the launch of the program. Georgia and Tennessee were added to the list of markets that were already included.
The program was promoted as a way to continue deliveries despite the Covid shutdowns, but the pilots still needed the presence ofScout Ambassadors to make sure nothing went wrong. The service made sense for a firm with a lot of investments in robot technology. It is a crowded field that is far from mainstream adoption.
The recent discontinuation of its Glow hardware is one of the reasons why the company decided to end real-world testing. Some of the acquisitions that have caught the attention of regulatory bodies like the FTC have been aggressive by Amazon.
The past year has seen the company put more promotional power into the offering, expanding its reach and peeling back the curtains at some of its research and development work.
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