(You can read much more about that project, and Hsieh’s tragic end, in WONDER BOY, a new book by current and former Forbes reporters David Jeans and Angel Au-Yeung.)Īfter pivoting to drones and moving to the Bay Area, Zipline’s cofounders initially aimed to corner the medical supply market, rather than retail goods. The company’s origins, however, date back to Romotive, a robotics toy startup that Rinaudo Cliffton launched in 2011 as part of former Zappos CEO Tony Hsieh’s Downtown Project in Las Vegas. Rinaudo Cliffton, a former professionally ranked rock climber, previously told Forbes that he co-founded the company in 2013 with Keenan Wyrobek, who is its chief technology officer. Those regulatory hurdles are getting closer to resolution, providing a potentially lucrative business opportunity for investors who came to the negotiating table in recent weeks.
operations remain contingent on FAA clearance. It began piloting commercial deliveries in partnership with Walmart the following year. That slower expansion stateside was boosted after Zipline received a waiver from the Federal Aviation Administration to use its drones to deliver Covid-19 relief supplies in 2020. Zipline is active in Arkansas, North Carolina and Utah in the U.S. “That is not what we’re seeing.”Īccording to a recent report, the company now operates in Cote d’Ivoire, Japan, Kenya and Nigeria, too. and then trickle its way out to these other countries,” cofounder and CEO Keller Rinaudo told Forbes at the time. “Most people think that advanced technology is going to start in the U.S. The company began deploying its autonomous delivery drones in Rwanda in 2016, then expanded to Ghana in the early months of the pandemic, business surged as it delivered blood and Covid-19 vaccines in those African nations. Zipline’s success to date has come in part from pursuing its technology in the developing world, pending further U.S.
Zipline cofounders Keller Rinaudo Cliffton and Keenan Wyrobek Courtesy of Zipline
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