Robots from Estonian company Starship Technologies are delivering groceries for UK convenience store chain Co-op in Wakefield, Yorkshire.

The service will initially be available to 13,000 residents across 6500 households, with orders made through the Starship food delivery app, which is available for download on iOS and Android. Groceries will be picked fresh from the Co-op store on Meadow Vale, Outwood, and delivered from store to door in minutes.

Anyone placing an order will also be able to enjoy a recently launched feature from Starship, with three robot characters available to customise the delivery experience. Wakefield residents can choose to receive their orders from Sir Lance-a-bot, Gizmo and Sunshine, with each greeting customers in their own unique way. Shoppers can also choose a song for their robot to play on arrival.

“We’re excited that this cutting-edge technology is coming to our district and helping our residents who might find it difficult to get out and about with an affordable and convenient way of doing their food shopping,” said Matthew Morley, Wakefield Council’s cabinet member for planning and highways. “The service is also environmentally friendly. The robots are zero emission; people won’t need to drive to the shops in their cars, and it will help to reduce food waste as people can order a small shop with the exact ingredients they need.”

Chris Conway, ecommerce director at Co-op, added: “Co-op stores are well placed in the heart of local communities to provide quick, easy and convenient home deliveries, whether a full shop or last-minute top-ups. We are committed to exploring new and innovative ways to increase access to our products and services, and delighted to be able to roll-out our autonomous robot deliveries to provide additional online flexibility and choice in Wakefield.”

The launch in Wakefield continues Starship’s recent expansion across Yorkshire and the north of England. The company’s robots are already a familiar sight in several other locations across the UK including Leeds, Trafford, Milton Keynes, Northampton, Bedford, Cambourne and Cambridge.

“We are delighted to officially launch our service in Wakefield and provide local residents with the opportunity to have their groceries delivered by our fleet of battery powered robots,” said Andrew Curtis, UK operations manager at Starship Technologies. “The robots have been widely welcomed everywhere they operate for the benefits they provide in terms of ease and convenience for people, while also having a positive environmental impact. We all want cleaner air to breathe, and our robots make short car journeys to the supermarket a thing of the past.”

Starship Technologies recently celebrated five years of commercial service and, since launch, the company’s robots have completed more than four million deliveries around the world, undertaking 140,000 road crossings every day.

Customers can choose from a wide range of grocery items, schedule their delivery, then drop a pin where they want it to be sent. They can watch the robot travel in real time via an interactive map, and will receive an alert when it arrives, and can meet and unlock the robot’s lid through the app to retrieve their groceries.

With a delivery fee starting from 99p, Starship’s robots are battery powered, lightweight and travel at the speed of a pedestrian. They use a combination of sensors, artificial intelligence and machine learning to travel on pavements and navigate around any obstacles, while computer vision-based navigation helps them map their environment to the nearest centimetre.

Starship was founded by Ahti Heinla (Skype chief architect) and Janus Friis (Skype co-founder) and Alastair Westgarth is the CEO.