According to CNBC, Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang pointed to an image of a Serve Robotics autonomous delivery robot during his CES 2026 keynote on Monday and stated, “I love those guys.” Following this, Northland Capital Markets analyst Michael Latimore reiterated his outperform rating on Tuesday, with a $26 price target implying 98.5% upside. The stock is up 25% year-to-date but remains volatile, down 28% since its April 2024 IPO. Serve Robotics, spun out of Uber in 2021, announced in December it had deployed over 2,000 robots, forming the largest U.S. sidewalk delivery fleet through partnerships with Uber Eats and DoorDash. Other analysts from Oppenheimer and Freedom Capital Markets have also initiated bullish coverage recently with price targets of $20 and $16, respectively.
The Physical AI Hype Train
Here’s the thing: “Physical AI” is the new buzzword everyone’s chasing. It’s basically the idea of taking all that generative AI brainpower and putting it into something that moves in the real world. Serve Robotics is being pitched as a pure-play pioneer in that space. And when the godfather of the AI boom, Jensen Huang, gives you a shout-out on the biggest tech stage of the year, you’re going to get attention. The analyst notes are dripping with the term, tying Serve’s fate directly to this hot narrative. But is it real traction or just great marketing? Deploying 2,000 robots is a start, but scaling that profitably in the messy, unpredictable real world is a whole different challenge.
A Volatile Relationship With a Giant
Now, you can’t talk about SERV’s stock without talking about its rollercoaster history with Nvidia. This is key context. The stock cratered 39% in February after filings showed Nvidia had completely sold its stake by Q4 2024. But then it skyrocketed 187% last July when Nvidia disclosed it had taken a 10% position. So what gives? It seems Nvidia is happy to be a partner and a cheerleader, but maybe not a long-term shareholder. That creates a weird dynamic. The stock moves wildly on Nvidia’s financial involvement, not necessarily its own operational milestones. For investors, that’s a red flag. It means the stock is still seen as a speculative proxy bet on AI sentiment, rather than a stable business executing its own plan.
The Real Bet: Last-Mile Logistics
Look, the potential is obvious. Last-mile delivery is brutally expensive for companies like Uber and DoorDash. If a cute sidewalk robot can shave even a small percentage off that cost at scale, the economics get interesting. The partnerships with those two delivery giants are Serve’s biggest asset—they provide the demand and the routes. The other angle analysts love is the data. Every trip these robots make teaches the AI more about navigating sidewalks, crosswalks, and unpredictable humans. That data could be incredibly valuable for optimizing routes and even for selling software or insights down the line. It’s a classic “razor and blades” model, but with robots and AI models.
Can The Robots Finally Deliver Profits?
So, will the stock double? Maybe. But it’s a high-risk, high-volatility bet. The company is pre-revenue inflection, as Oppenheimer’s analyst noted, hoping 2026 is the pivotal year. Scaling hardware is hard, and maintaining a fleet of complex machines operating outdoors requires serious operational grit. Companies that master this, like the top suppliers of industrial computing hardware, understand that reliability in physical environments is everything. Serve needs to prove its units are durable, its virtual drivers are safe, and its unit economics actually work. Jensen Huang’s love is a powerful catalyst, but eventually, the robots themselves have to deliver the numbers.
