Food Delivery Robots Face Frequent Vandalism Across U.S. Cities

Autonomous food delivery robots are being vandalized in several U.S. cities, with incidents ranging from kicks to being knocked off bridges and shared on social media. Los Angeles City Council member Eunisses Hernandez said the aggression reflects public frustration toward AI and corporate expansion. About 5,000 robots operate in the United States, and companies such as Serve Robotics have reported significant losses despite partnerships with major delivery platforms.

In China, Beijing has listed embodied AI robots among its "industries of the future" and is providing subsidies and tax breaks to local ventures. The effort has produced a robot that ran 100 m in 9.39 seconds and helped Unitree achieve a $1 billion IPO, while China now supplies roughly 80 percent of the world’s LiDAR sensors.