Zipline Raises $1.5B at $21.5B, Adds 300 Walmart Sites

Zipline, the drone delivery company that started by flying blood to hospitals in Rwanda, has raised $1.5 billion at a $21.5 billion post-money valuation, the company announced on Thursday. Paradigm, WCM Investment Management and Layer Global led the round. Valor Equity Partners, Fidelity Management & Research Company, Uber, Tiger Global, J.P. Morgan, ARK Invest and Salesforce Ventures also invested.

Alongside the raise, Zipline and Walmart signed a new national, multi-year agreement to launch 300 additional drone delivery sites in the United States. The two companies have worked together since 2021 and run 21 active sites today, TechCrunch reports.

What the money is for

Zipline says the funds will expand its US manufacturing and hiring so it can build a nationwide home-delivery network. Its home-delivery drones carry up to 8 pounds (about 3.6kg) within a 10-mile radius; its older long-range aircraft, the ones used in Africa, cover 120 miles round trip, according to TechCrunch.

The company gave a set of operating figures with the announcement, all its own claims: more than one million deliveries in the Dallas-Fort Worth area this year, a median of 19 minutes from checkout to doorstep in October, and 150 million commercial autonomous miles flown without a safety incident. Restaurants on its platform, it says, saw Zipline's share of their delivery revenue rise from 10.8% to 34.9% between March and October. Uber is targeting one million deliveries a day with Zipline by 2029.

Paradigm co-founder Matt Huang called Zipline "one of the largest autonomous robotics companies in the world" in the release.

Related · StartupsZipline Raises $1.5bn at $21.5bn as Walmart Adds 300 SitesThe drone delivery company that began with blood runs in Rwanda and flies medicines in three Nigerian states nearly tripled its valuation since January.

The Nigerian network

Zipline has operated in Nigeria since 2022, delivering vaccines and medicines by drone to health facilities in Kaduna, Cross River and Bayelsa states. Its Nigeria country director, Anthonio Pinheiro, told Techpoint Africa in July that the company had delivered 6.1 million vaccine doses and more than a million units of medical products across about 180,000 deliveries.

In May, Zipline set out plans with the Federal Ministry of Health to build 12 more distribution centres in Nigeria, taking it from three hubs to 15 by 2028, to reach about 20,000 health facilities and nearly 100 million people, TechAfrica News reported. Under the plan, a US government grant would cover construction and equipment and the Nigerian government would cover running costs, Techpoint reported. Airspace and regulatory approvals remain a hurdle for drone operations in Nigeria.

The new round is aimed at the United States. The release names only one African market, Côte d'Ivoire, where Zipline is building a national network expected to serve more than 2,200 health facilities and 12 million people.