Zipline in talks to raise $1 billion at a $20 billion valuation

Drone delivery company Zipline is in discussions to raise approximately $1 billion in a new funding round that would value the company at around $20 billion, nearly triple its previous valuation, according to a Bloomberg report citing people familiar with the matter.

Venture capital firm Paradigm, an existing Zipline investor, is reportedly leading the talks to arrange the round, with earlier backer Tiger Global Management said to be weighing participation as well, Bloomberg’s sources said, speaking anonymously because the details are not yet public. The discussions remain at an early stage and the terms could still change, the sources cautioned. Zipline and Paradigm declined to comment on the report, while Tiger Global did not respond to Bloomberg's request for comment.

Bloomberg’s sources said, speaking anonymously because the details are not yet public. The discussions remain at an early stage and the terms could still change, the sources cautioned. Zipline and Paradigm declined to comment on the report, while Tiger Global did not respond to Bloomberg's request for comment.

Founded in 2014, Zipline was last valued at $7.6 billion in an earlier 2026 financing round meant to support its commercial rollout, a round that was expanded to $800 million with an extra $200 million and coincided with a national-scale contract in Rwanda to deploy Zipline's Platform 2 technology across major cities and open a third distribution centre. By that point, the company’s aircraft had flown more than 100 million miles and completed over a million deliveries across four continents.

Momentum has only built since. Zipline saw a 13-fold surge in businesses offering delivery through its app in the first half of 2026, pushing total commercial deliveries past 2.5 million, with a million of those completed in just the preceding 12 months. The company used that growth to double down on the US market, launching a healthcare home-delivery service with Cleveland Clinic in Cleveland and preparing food and retail delivery in Austin through local restaurants and national chains such as Little Caesars, which was scaling from five locations to 65.

That US expansion culminated in August, when Zipline announced a partnership with, and investment from, Uber and Zipline said they were targeting one million drone deliveries per day by the end of 2029, with the first deployments beginning in markets where Zipline already operates, including Dallas and Houston. The tie-up came alongside former Uber CEO Travis Kalanick’s own move into autonomous robotics with a new venture called Atoms.

Zipline's growth has extended well beyond the US as well. In Kenya, the company partnered with animal-health firm Zoetis to deliver veterinary products such as wound-care and production-health medicines to rural clinics, animal-health-service providers and farms, cutting delivery times from hours or days to minutes. More broadly across the continent, Zipline and the Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention signed a memorandum of understanding to strengthen health-system responsiveness, epidemic preparedness and access to medical supplies through drone-enabled logistics — building on operations already running in Rwanda, Ghana, Nigeria, Kenya and Côte d'Ivoire.

It’s against that backdrop of compounding US commercial adoption, a major platform partnership with Uber, and deepening healthcare-logistics footprint across Africa that Bloomberg's report of talks for a roughly $20 billion valuation is emerging. Zipline counts Valor Equity Partners and Sequoia Capital among its top investors and says on its website it has completed nearly 3 million deliveries across more than 140 million miles for customers including Chipotle Mexican Grill, Jimmy John’s and Walmart, a customer base that, if the new round closes as described, would be backing a company worth nearly three times what it was valued at just months earlier.