Serve Robotics: Scaling Sidewalk Autonomy Comes At A Cost
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Richard Durant9.4K FollowersFollow5ShareSavePlay(13min)CommentsSummaryServe Robotics is scaling a fleet of autonomous delivery robots, which should lead to very strong growth over the next few years.Its technology is still under development, though, and its unit economics are negative as a result.The combination of strong growth and negative gross margins will lead to a large increase in losses in 2026.While SERV has potential, uncertainty around competition and market structure, coupled with the prospect of large near-term losses, makes me neutral on the stock.vladimir soldatov/iStock via Getty Images Serve Robotics (SERV) is a developer of autonomous delivery robots that has begun to scale deployments in food delivery. While this should result in strong growth in coming years, the company still has significant work toThis article was written byRichard Durant9.4K FollowersFollowRichard Durant is the leader of Narweena, an asset manager focused on finding market dislocations that are the result of a poor understanding of a businesses long-term prospects. Narweena believes that excess risk adjusted returns can be achieved by identifying businesses with secular growth opportunities in markets with barriers to entry. Narweena’s research process is focused on company and industry fundamentals with the goal of uncovering unique insights. Narweena has a high risk appetite and a long-term horizon, in pursuit of stocks that are deeply undervalued. Coverage tilts towards smaller cap stocks and markets where competitive advantages are not obvious.Investments are driven by a belief that an aging population with low population growth and stagnating productivity growth will create a different opportunity set to what has worked in the past. Many industries are likely to face stagnation or secular decline, which counter-intuitively may improve business performance if competition decreases. Conversely, other businesses are likely to face rising costs and diseconomies of scale. In addition, economies are becoming increasingly dominated by asset light businesses, and the need for infrastructure investments is declining over time. As a result, a large pool of capital is chasing a limited set of investment opportunities, which is driving up asset prices and compressing risk premia over time.Durant has undergraduate degrees in engineering and finance from the University of Adelaide (Honors) and an MBA from Nanyang Technological University (Dean’s Honors List). He has also passed the CFA exams.Analyst’s Disclosure:I/we have no stock, option or similar derivative position in any of the companies mentioned, and no plans to initiate any such positions within the next 72 hours. I wrote this article myself, and it expresses my own opinions. I am not receiving compensation for it (other than from Seeking Alpha). I have no business relationship with any company whose stock is mentioned in this article. Seeking Alpha's Disclosure: Past performance is no guarantee of future results. No recommendation or advice is being given as to whether any investment is suitable for a particular investor. Any views or opinions expressed above may not reflect those of Seeking Alpha as a whole. Seeking Alpha is not a licensed securities dealer, broker or US investment adviser or investment bank. Our analysts are third party authors that include both professional investors and individual investors who may not be licensed or certified by any institute or regulatory body.