Amazon Just Bought the $100M Robot That Could Fix Last-Mile Delivery

Amazon has acquired Rivr, the Zurich robotics startup behind a four-legged, wheeled delivery robot that its CEO once described as a "dog on roller skates." Terms were not disclosed. Amazon confirmed the deal, first reported by The Information, via a notice sent to its network of third-party delivery contractors rather than through a public announcement.

"We want to share that we've recently acquired RIVR, a company focused on technology that can help with doorstep delivery," Amazon wrote in the notice viewed by CNBC. "We believe this technology, when working alongside your [delivery associates], has the potential to further improve safety outcomes and the overall customer experience, particularly in the last steps of the delivery process."

Rivr, formerly known as Swiss-Mile, was founded by Marko Bjelonic, who will continue with Amazon following the acquisition. Bjelonic framed the deal in a LinkedIn post as an acceleration toward what he called General Physical AI — robotics and AI deployed at real-world scale. "Building General Physical AI through doorstep delivery," he wrote, "bringing robotics and AI closer to real-world deployment at scale."

The startup had raised $25 million total, including a $22.2 million seed round in 2024 backed by Amazon's Industrial Innovation Fund and Bezos Expeditions, Amazon founder Jeff Bezos's personal venture firm. Rivr was last valued at approximately $100 million, according to PitchBook data cited by TechCrunch.

Before the acquisition, Rivr ran a pilot program in Austin with package delivery company Veho. Bjelonic said at the time he hoped to scale to 100 bots by 2026 — a milestone whose status is unclear given the acquisition.

What made Rivr notable was the robot's mobility architecture. Unlike typical wheeled delivery robots that struggle with curbs and stairs, Rivr's machine combines legs with wheels, giving it something closer to the terrain adaptability of a quadruped animal while retaining the efficiency of wheels on flat surfaces. The robot is designed to accompany a delivery associate on a route, carrying packages from the van to the doorstep.

Amazon has been quietly building its robotics portfolio for more than a decade. It acquired Kiva Systems for $775 million in 2012 — a deal that proved transformative for warehouse automation — and now deploys more than 1 million robots across its operations network. The Industrial Innovation Fund, launched in 2022, was specifically designed to back logistics and warehouse technologies, with Rivr as one of its early bets.

The quiet announcement to delivery contractors — rather than a press release — is notable. Amazon is acutely conscious of the labor dynamics around automation: its DSP (Delivery Service Partner) model depends on thousands of small business owners who employ delivery associates. Framing Rivr as an "alongside" tool for those associates rather than a replacement is deliberate messaging. An Amazon spokesperson told CNBC the acquisition reflects "our commitment to a continued investment in research" and efforts to improve safety for delivery employees.

That framing will face scrutiny. Amazon has deployed warehouse robotics at massive scale while maintaining that its automation investments create more jobs than they displace — a claim labor economists continue to debate. Rivr's robot is explicitly designed for the last-leg portion of delivery, which is physically demanding and has historically been resistant to automation because of the variety of terrain, steps, and access conditions. If the robot works reliably, it changes what a delivery associate does on a route. If it doesn't, it joins the long list of last-mile automation experiments that didn't survive contact with the real world.