The food delivery robots saw their largest sale day during the coronavirus pandemic, according to Starship Technologies. | Kathryn Lenihan/The Cougar

Despite UH dining facing some difficulties during the coronavirus pandemic, the food delivery robots operated by Starship Technologies have seen a recent influx in sales.

With the increased demand for social distancing, Starship Technologies is continuing to offer contactless food delivery, which the company partly attributes to their recent success in sales.

“Starship deliveries have been skyrocketing recently,” said Starship Technologies spokesperson Janel Steinberg. “People want contactless delivery for social distancing and safety reasons, and now see our service as an important part of how they buy their food. In fact, we had our biggest day on record last week.”

As an increased precaution in response to the pandemic, the robots are now more frequently sanitized before serving UH community members.

“Our robots have already been providing contactless delivery, but we have included enhanced cleaning and sanitization procedures to ensure safety for all partners and customers.”

While delivering food, the robots are expected to follow the same traffic laws and guidelines as other pedestrians.

In the case where a dining robot hits or is hit by a moving vehicle, the incident would be handled using regular insurance policies.

“Our robots have years of experience in the real world, having safely crossed more than 15 million roads and completed more than 500,000 deliveries,” Steinberg said. “On the rare occasion, something like this happens, normal insurance procedures would be followed.”

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“Dining robot orders ‘skyrocketing’ after semester’s start” was originally posted on The Cougar