System and method for robotic delivery between moving targets

A robot to navigate from an origin within a building to a non-stationary destination, the robot comprising:

• one or more sensors that collect sensor data;
• one or more processors;
• a non-transitory computer-readable medium having instructions embodied thereon, the instructions, when executed by the one or more processors, perform operations comprising:
• receiving a task comprising navigation from an origin to a non-stationary destination;
• navigating to the origin;
• at the origin, detecting an interaction with the robot that is associated with introducing an item to a storage compartment of the robot;
• locking the storage compartment;
• identifying a current location of the non-stationary destination by interrogating a remote computer having information about the non-stationary destination for the current location of the non-stationary destination;
• moving towards the current location of the non-stationary destination;
• while moving towards the current location of the non-stationary destination:
• determining that the non-stationary destination has changed location by interrogating the remote computer for an updated current location of the non-stationary destination;
• predicting a next location of the non-stationary destination using an artificial intelligence prediction algorithm;
• calculating an updated route to the updated current location of the non-stationary destination;
• moving towards the predicted next location of the non-stationary destination via the updated route;
• determining whether the robot has arrived at the non-stationary destination;
• in response to determining that the robot has not arrived at the non-stationary destination, repeating the determining, predicting, calculating, and moving until the robot has arrived at the non-stationary destination;
• unlocking the storage compartment.

A method for navigating a robot from a non-stationary origin to a destination within a building, the method comprising:

• receiving a task comprising navigating from a non-stationary origin to a destination;
• identifying a current location of the non-stationary origin by interrogating a remote computer having information about the non-stationary origin for the current location of the non-stationary origin;
• moving towards the current location of the non-stationary origin;
• while moving towards the current location of the non-stationary origin:
• determining that the non-stationary origin has changed location by interrogating the remote computer for an updated current location of the non-stationary origin;
• predicting a next location of the non-stationary origin using an artificial intelligence prediction algorithm;
• calculating an updated route to the updated current location of the non-stationary origin;
• moving towards the predicted next location of the non-stationary origin via the updated route;
• determining whether the robot has arrived at the non-stationary origin;
• in response to determining that the robot has not arrived at the non-stationary origin, repeating the determining, predicting, calculating, and moving until the robot has arrived at the non-stationary origin;
• detecting an interaction with the robot that is associated with introducing an item to or removing an item from a storage compartment in the robot;
• moving towards the destination within the building.