Uber Surprises Serve Robotics with Entire Stake Sale

Uber has exited its investment in Serve Robotics, the autonomous delivery robot company it spun out more than five years ago.

Uber made the disclosure in a regulatory filing that was first reported by Bloomberg, revealing a year-long process of reducing its stake in the company.

Still, the final selloff caught Serve off guard, with the company learning about it only after it was officially disclosed, according to a source familiar with the events.

The divestiture comes as the two companies have started to diverge on the business side, with Serve Robotics pursuing its own path in the autonomous delivery market.

Serve got its start as Postmates X, the robotics division of the on-demand delivery startup Postmates that Uber acquired in 2020 for $2.65 billion.

A year later, the division spun out as an independent company called Serve Robotics, a name taken from the autonomous sidewalk delivery bot that was developed and piloted by Postmates X.

Uber not only backed Serve but also struck a partnership with the sidewalk delivery robot firm in 2022, expanding it in May 2023 to deploy up to 2,000 of Serve's sidewalk bots onto Uber's app in multiple markets in the United States.

However, it appears that Uber started pulling back earlier this year, with Serve Robotics co-founder and CEO Ali Kashani commenting on the company's second-quarter earnings call that the companies have 'differing views' about the operating model to scale its shared autonomous fleet.

Kashani noted that during the same timeframe, Serve Robotics saw deliveries with another food delivery partner grow nearly 50% in a single quarter, leading Serve to decide not to renew the partnership agreement with Uber when it expires in early 2027.

As a result, Uber's exit from Serve Robotics may not come as a surprise, given the growing divergence between the two companies.

• Serve Robotics is one of more than 30 autonomous vehicle technology companies that Uber has either partnered with or invested in over the past several years.

The company's future plans and partnerships remain to be seen, but it's clear that Uber's investment in Serve Robotics has come to an end.

Uber's sale of its stake in Serve Robotics marks the latest development in the ever-evolving autonomous delivery market, with companies continuing to explore new partnerships and technologies to stay ahead in the game.