OttOmate: Recent Episodes
Christopher Albrecht
Feed Us Ex Machina
From delivery robots and drones, to smart vending machines and cashierless checkout, OttOmate is the weekly show where we interview the leaders who are building the future of food robotics and automation.
This is the audio from OttOmate's recent live Q&A webinar with the NSF's Orsi Dezsi. We cover all kinds of topics around how to build food safe robots and machines such as materials, sourcing parts and issues around the supply chain. We also take a bunch of great questions from startup founders in the audience.
If you want to understand the role of technology in restaurants, then there is no better person to talk with than Kristen Hawley. In addition to being a freelance journalist who covers tech in restaurants, she is also the founder and writer of the excellent Expedite newsletter. So as I was bringing the OttOmate podcast back to life, I couldn’t think of a better guest for its return. In today’s discussion we talk about restaurants being at the “healthy curiosity” phase of adoption, why we’re seeing server robots pop up in smaller markets, and why restauranteurs might be interested in getting exo-skeleton type suits for their staff.
When you bring up the subject of job losses, food robot and automation startups are always quick to point out that while some existing jobs will be lost, different and better jobs fueled by technology will be created.
If this is true, then food robotics startups will need to make sure that these new tech-centered jobs are available to everyone — not just the same people occupying tech jobs today.
That’s why I’m working with Per Scholas, a non-profit out of Chicago (I have no financial relationship with the company). Per Scholas trains underrepresented groups (for free!) in technology including AWS, JAVA and IT certifications. Not only that, Per Scholas works with employers to help find jobs for its alumns.
In this week’s podcast, I sat down with Senior Manager, Business Solutions at Per Scholas to talk about what Per Scholas operates with both trainees and employers.
If you’re a robot/automation startup serious about finding jobs for displaced food workers, Per Scholas is a great non-profit to connect with and support.
I this week’s OttOmate podcast, I sit down with Chef Rivera to get his take on food robots on automation. This is a conversation I hope every food robot startup CEO listens to because Rivera has some really good points about what tech people miss when designing robots for restaurants. Restaurant workers, for example, are not mono-taskers, a line cook could be prepping, washing dishes or doing any number of jobs that need to be done that night.
You may know Dishcraft because of its robot dishwasher, or its dishes-as-a-service for restaurants and cafeterias or maybe even its innovative resuable container program to save the world from drowing in single-use takeout plastics.
But did you know that in addition to cleaning and sanitizing, Dishcraft also tests dishes for allergens?
I didn’t until I interviewed Dishscraft Co-Founder and CEO Linda Pouliot for this week’s OttOmate podcast. Not only did she share that bit about allergen testing, but Pouliot also revealed plans for their expanding reusable container program (new sizes!), and the soaking robot that was added to Dishcraft’s automated lineup.
This week’s OttOmate podcast guest is Jeff Wells, Lead Editor for Grocery Dive and one of the smartest folks covering the changing grocery biz.
When we recorded this podcast, Jeff had just published a big story on Kroger’s move into half hour delivery, so we naturally chatted about that, as well as whether automated fulfillment is living up to its promise in grocery and the looming presence of Amazon over the industry.
Paid OttOmate subscribers get access to our podcasts a week before everyone else! If that’s you — you. are. awesome. Thank you! If you’re not a subscriber yet? What are you waiting for, go sign up now!
This week’s podcast is with Barney Wragg, Founder and CEO of Karakuri, which makes the Semblr all-in-one canteen robot.
The Semblr holds 17 different temperature-controlled ingredients that can be dispensed down to the gram. With this level of control, Semblr can make 2,700 different meal combinations.
Karakuri recently installed its first Semblr for public use at Ocado’s (which invested in Karakuri) headquarters in England. I took that opportunity to catch up with Wragg to talk about:
- The specific labor issues Semblr solves
- How Semblr fights food waste
- How much it will cost to get your own Semblr ‘bot
I don’t know about you, but I hate weeding. Seeing that it’s a losing battle, I’ve just surrendered my yard to that infernal plant-life. I honestly can’t imagine what it’s like trying to tackle weeds on a farm that’s hundreds of acres big.
But that’s why Farmwise built its big, industrial weeding robot. The remote controlled machine goes up and down crop rows, identifying and cutting out all those pesky weeds.
My podcast this week is with Sébastien Boyer, Co-Founder and CEO of Farmwise. In our chat Boyer talks about:
- What else besides labor is pushing farmers into robotic weeding
- Common misperceptions about farmers
- Some of his thoughts on the burgeoning indoor ag movement
Young robot startups could probably learn a thing or two from Blendid. The smoothie-making robot company has been around for a few years now and has pretty much done it all: fundraising from both VCs and the crowd, co-branded partnerships with national-level brands, and installing its robots at both retail and universities.
So it’s amazing to have as our guest on the OttOmate Podcast this week Covahne Michaels, the VP of Marketing for Blendid. In our chat we discuss:
- How equity crowdfunding is actually a lot of work (spoiler: Webinars!)
- Leveraging Jamba Juice’s brand for consumer adoption
- How health inspections are getting easier across the country
- How quickly you can get your own Blendid machine up and running
I talk with a lot of founders who are building startups, so it’s great to chat with someone on the other side of the equation — an investor cutting the checks to fund those startups, getting them out of the garage and into market.
My guest on the OttOmate podcast this week is Maggie Sprenger, the Managing Director at Green Cow Venture Capital, which invests in early stage startups. Sprenger has actually been quite active in the food automation space having backed Bear Flag Robotics (which only raised $12.5 million and was bought this summer by John Deere for $250 million), robot smoothie maker Blendid and the robotics management platform, Freedom Robotics.
In our conversation, Sprenger talks about:
- Bear Flag’s exit and the massive opportunity in ag tech
- The highly competitive early stage investment landscape
- The good and bad of equity crowdfunding
- Why she is excited about what a “bloodbath” it is out there for startups
As always, paid subscribers get access to the OttOmate podcasts a week early. If that includes you — thank you! Your support means a lot.
Just a quick reminder that subscribers get early access to the OttOmate podcast a week before it is released to the general public. If you’re a subscriber - thank you! If you’re not yet - go subscribe now!
It’s not surprising that pizza is one of, if not the most popular food being made by robots right now. I mean, who doesn’t love pizza? (Nobody, that’s who)
Among the wave of automated pizza startups is Piestro, which is building a robotic vending machine that tops, cooks and boxes up fresh hot pizza in under three minutes. Though it won’t arrive until next year, Piestro has already signed a deal to power 3,600 autonomous pizza machines for 800 Degrees Pizza over the next five years.
On today’s OttOmate podcast, I chat with the robot prince of pizza himself, Massimo Noja De Marco, CEO of Piestro. We discuss:
- The future of co-branding for automated food startups
- How automation can save pizzerias $60,000 a year in cheese alone
- Piestro’s plans to make their machine mobile to create “Pizza as a Service”
Take a listen — just maybe not on an empty stomach.
Think you’d be a great guest on the OttOmate show, drop me a line and pitch me.
Dibyananda Brahma, Mukunda Foods VP of Growth, explains why the company is building out its own robot-powered ghost kitchens around the world. Is this a path for other automation companies to reach scale?