Grab's CTO on why robots matter more than you think

Grab just put a robot named Carri to work in Singapore's Punggol district. Actual deliveries. Not a test. Not a press release stunt—real orders, real neighborhoods. So what's the play here? The company's CTO clearly sees a future where autonomous machines handle the same routes human drivers do today, but cheaper and without the labor logistics.

Here's the thing that tells you everything about how serious they are: the CTO uses competitor robots in Grab's own office. He's not waiting for a perfect internal solution. He's studying what works, borrowing their tech, learning from what already exists in the market. That's the opposite of startup ego—it's pragmatism dressed up as confidence. The goal is to understand robotics at scale, not to invent something in a vacuum that nobody actually wants.

Why does this matter for Southeast Asia? Because Grab isn't just a ride app anymore. They're building infrastructure. Robots move packages cheaper than people. Autonomous vehicles reduce driver dependency. Both of those things reshape how a superapp survives long-term in countries where labor costs keep rising and margins keep shrinking. The human drivers aren't going anywhere tomorrow, but Carri's first run in Punggol isn't really about one neighborhood—it's about proving the model works before scaling it everywhere.