Walmart Goes National With Zipline Drones Backed by $1.5B Raise

Zipline has raised $1.5 billion to build out a nationwide U.S. drone delivery network for Walmart, with 300 new store locations joining a program that has already completed more than 2 million deliveries since 2021. The funding round values the operator at $21.5 billion, the company said Thursday — roughly fourteen times the amount raised.

The scale of the commitment is the story. But the detail that matters for anyone mapping last-mile capacity is what Walmart did not say: the retailer has no timeline and no list of target areas for the expansion, spokeswoman Lindsey Coulter confirmed.

What does the deal actually cover?

Zipline, the world's largest drone delivery provider by miles flown, will use the capital to expand its U.S. manufacturing facilities and accelerate hiring. The round was led by Paradigm, WCM Investment Management and Layer Global, with participation from Tiger Global, Uber and J.P. Morgan, among others.

Walmart currently operates 21 drone sites with Zipline and also runs a parallel program with Alphabet's Wing. In July, Wing and Walmart launched drone delivery at five locations in Central Florida, following earlier launches in Houston, Atlanta and Dallas-Fort Worth. The partners aim to offer drone delivery from more than 270 locations across nearly 20 metro areas — including Seattle and Denver — by 2027.

Two additional Wing launches appear imminent. Walmart and Wing are poised to begin drone delivery in West Memphis, Arkansas, according to DroneXL.co, and Wing has applied with the city of Manchester, Missouri, to operate from the local Walmart store, KMOV TV reported. Wing also flies for DoorDash and Lowe's.

Why the speed race is intensifying

Walmart and Amazon are both building same-day and one-hour store-to-door networks on the premise that speed converts browsers into buyers. The numbers support the premise, at least directionally: Walmart's U.S. e-commerce sales grew 24% in the second quarter, with deliveries fulfilled from local stores up 43%.

Amazon, for its part, plans to extend Prime Air drone delivery to nearly 500 U.S. communities by year's end — covering roughly 30 million people, up from a dozen locations today.

For shippers and forwarders, the commercial logic is straightforward. Ground last-mile, largely gig-driver based, is being supplemented by air capacity that bypasses road congestion entirely. Zipline's customers order through the Walmart app or Walmart.com; if their address falls within delivery range, they checkout as usual and track the order as it flies. Deliveries land in the front yard, backyard or driveway in as little as 30 minutes. Drones hover at about 330 feet while a tethered pod descends — a design choice the company promotes as a noise mitigation measure in residential areas.

Zipline holds Part 135 air carrier permissions and is authorized for beyond-visual-line-of-sight operations, a regulatory status only a handful of U.S. drone operators have achieved.

Is the demand real or promotional?

"We see customers try drone delivery for the novelty and then continue to come back to it for the convenience when they need something in minutes," said Greg Cathey, senior vice president of e-commerce fulfillment transformation at Walmart. "Walmart's stores put us close to the communities we serve. With Zipline, we can build on that proximity and bring this fast delivery option to even more customers across the country."

Two million completed deliveries since 2021 is a genuine volume figure, not a pilot press release. The usage data is more telling: Zipline says its share of delivery revenue at long-tenured restaurant customers tripled to 35% over the past six months — and that the increase did not cannibalize demand from other delivery platforms.

Uber is targeting one million deliveries per day with Zipline by 2029. Restaurant holding company Wonder is building new storefronts and kitchens optimized specifically for Zipline delivery, betting site design on aerial economics.

"Zipline has already brought the future of delivery to the communities it serves. Now, the opportunity is to reach millions more," said Anton Levy, founder and managing partner of Layer Global.

The physical backbone

Walmart's structural advantage is store density: 90% of the U.S. population lives within 10 miles of one of its thousands of stores. Zipline, founded 10 years ago, also runs an international logistics network serving more than 5,000 hospitals, and last summer launched its first U.S. healthcare home delivery service with Cleveland Clinic, starting in a Cleveland suburb. That program will expand to lab samples, medically tailored meals, surgical supplies and hospital-at-home materials; Zipline also partners with Mayo Clinic.

Retail drone delivery remains a small fraction of total last-mile volume, and the missing rollout schedule tempers the headline. But with $1.5 billion in fresh capital, a 270-site target for 2027 and Amazon pushing toward 500 communities this year, the aerial last-mile is moving from experiment to network build — and the shippers who anchor it are paying for the capacity now.