Zipline’s Valuation Could Nearly Triple as Drone Delivery Rules Remain Unsettled

Zipline is putting a fresh valuation on the increasingly crowded race to make drone delivery a mainstream part of American last-mile logistics networks, all while the regulatory system is still playing catch-up.

The autonomous delivery company is in talks to raise roughly $1 billion that would value the firm of roughly $20 billion, according to Bloomberg, nearly tripling the $7.6 billion valuation it established in January.

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Venture capital firm Paradigm, which invested $200 million in Zipline in March, is reportedly in discussion to lead the new round, while another investor Tiger Global Management is considering participating. The talks are preliminary and could still change.

Zipline is giving investors plenty of evidence that it intends to put that capital to work. Last week, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) opened a review into a proposal from the drone delivery company that would allow as many as 220,000 deliveries per day from 220 charging stations and 4,400 pickup kiosks across five Texas metropolitan areas: Houston, San Antonio, Austin, Amarillo and El Paso.

That would be a significant jump from the roughly 30,000 daily deliveries Zipline is currently authorized to conduct in Dallas-Fort Worth.

As Zipline and its competitors expand their physical networks, the regulatory framework for large-scale drone operations is still largely undetermined. Part 108 , the long-awaited FAA rule governing routine beyond-visual-line-of-sight drone operations, remains unsigned despite its proposal by the Department of Transportation last August.

The rule is expected to create a more standardized path for package delivery, which now relies on a patchwork of waivers, exemptions and geographically limited approvals.