Alphabet Cancels Drone Deal With Starbucks As Project Leaders Pushed Out
Google's parent Alphabet Inc. canceled a drone partnership with coffee giant Starbucks Corp. amid the tightening budgets, Bloomberg reported Tuesday, citing people familiar with the matter.
The move follows the decision by Project Wing, a unit of Alphabet's X research lab, that pushed out two managers on its drone-delivery project in October amid conflict between the engineers and its commercial team.
In pre-market activity on Wednesday, shares were losing around 2.2 percent.
Last month, Project Wing, which has been developing delivery drones since 2012, pushed out the project's chief, Dave Vos, and its top commercial executive, Sean Mullaney. Following this, the firm stopped hiring in the Project Wing and also reportedly asked some staff to seek jobs elsewhere in the company.
Since initial days, the drone project has been facing issues. In 2014, its original head departed.
As per reports, the engineering team wanted to delay to ensure the drones were reliable and safe. Some of them also disagreed over the decision in September to deliver food in a test at Virginia Tech. (dpa)
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