"Self-Driving Delivery Robots" will be operated in the middle of Gangnam, Seoul

Seoul City will start the demonstration of “Self-driving Delivery Robots” in the middle of Gangnam, Seoul.

It is part of the effort to create a robot-friendly environment and expand public infrastructure in line with changes in the citizens’ living environment, such as an increase in single-person households and a surge in delivery services.

According to the robot industry report (Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy, 2020), 160 professional service robot companies, which takes 48% of the entire companies in Korea, is located in the Seoul metropolitan area and the sales of professional service robots in this region reach 232.5 billion won, which is 50% of the whole sales.

The Seoul Metropolitan Government is also promoting various robot industry support projects, such as creating robot clusters in the Suseo area, supporting technology development, and nurturing human resources through the robot academy, in order to create a robot-friendly city.

The Seoul Metropolitan Government will demonstrate "autonomous driving" delivery robots in the delivery field, which demand has exploded since Covid-19, and plans to expand the contact points that citizens can access in everyday life by starting delivery robot services in COEX and Teheranro, and improve technology through demonstration.

Seoul Metropolitan Government, along with Woowahan Brothers, LG Electronics, WTC Seoul, Korea National Land Information Corporation, and Gangnam-gu, was selected as the Suseo Robot Cluster Project, which includes attracting robot companies and creating robot venture towns, building core anchor facilities for robot clusters, creating test fields, and forming cooperation governance, in the AI · 5G-based large-scale robot convergence model demonstration project organized by the Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy. Till November next year, the demonstration project will be carried out for 18 months.

From June 2022, demonstrations of indoor delivery robots will be carried out from COEX stores to the entrance of the trade center building. In 2023, demonstrations of outdoor delivery robots will be carried out from stores to office lobbies in Tehranro. During this period, a total of 11 autonomous delivery robots will be operated.

COEX and Teheranro are selected as the demonstration sites since the areas are the best place for robot demonstrations with 33,000 resident employees, large-scale business facilities, and complex shopping malls with more than 40 million visitors per year.

A total of 1.97 billion won (970 million won in government expenses, 600 million won in city expenses, and 400 million won in district expenses) will be invested for two years.

Seoul Metropolitan Government will secure empirical data in real-world environments with a large floating population and high demand for delivery robots and will improve regulations such as robot operation standards and personal information protection guides.

In particular, the central ministry plans to actively urge the central government to establish safety standards for outdoor driving robots in order to promote the delivery robots' passage on sidewalks.

Through this demonstration project, the Seoul Metropolitan Government will find improvements in indoor and outdoor delivery robot products and services, and public institutions such as Seoul City will build and operate an integrated control system based on indoor and outdoor 5G, and build an indoor digital address map for robot services.

“This is the first time that demonstrations have been made in large-scale spaces that citizens often visit, such as COEX and Teheranro,” said Hwang Bo-yeon, director of economic policy at Seoul Metropolitan Government. “The Seoul Metropolitan Government will expand the public infrastructure of urban robot services due to changes in urban life, such as single-person households and telecommuting, and create a Suseo cluster for preempting the robot market, which is highly competitive in the global market.”
 

Reported by Smart City Today