SAN FRANCISCO: In the future, robots are going to be in charge of your food. Robot baristas will make you a latte, robot chefs will whip you up a pizza, and robot couriers will deliver you your lunch.
Silicon Valley CEO Angelo Vardakostas and mechanical engineer Steven Frehn will open the doors of a classy burger joint called Creator in San Francisco in which a burger bot will prepare you a delicious burger for just $6!
The machine itself is enough to make you drool. Sleek curves and subtle design cues make it look like a work of art. The machine truly imparts its creators’ vision, which, according to a recent interview, is to “shape the future of fast food”.
Its specifications are impressive. It can whip up 120 burgers an hour and will cost less than $1 million, though the pair doesn’t have plans to license the machine yet, they will likely re-evaluate after their restaurant officially opens.
But there lingers a wave of fear that robots will take over the job market and humans will have a hard time finding work with decent wages.
It’s a tough question that’s been plaguing the future prospects and it’s a very real one. Automation is set to destroy a lot of jobs — according to a 2017 study, 1.8 million of them worldwide by 2020.
There have been plenty of backlashes from the food industry itself. Las Vegas food service workers went on strike back in May to protest robots taking their jobs.
But automation is becoming an unstoppable force. Countless fast food joints are imbuing their restaurants with automated bells and whistles, from salad preparing machines to self-serve kiosks. It’s a growing trend that’s already shaping the future of the way we enjoy and prepare food.
But it’s not all doom and gloom. A restaurant is more than a gigantic 14-foot long burger bot standing in the middle of an empty room. Employees still have to maintain the machine, refill ingredients, instruct customers on how to use it, advise them on how to make a selection, clean, and manage the space itself.
Creator will have up to nine employees working during peak hours, roughly the norm in the conventional fast food industry.
So will burger joints like Creator catch on? Hard to say at this point!
For now, Creator is one burger joint of the million or so that provide such a futuristic experience and it will gradually but surely win over the hearts of those who oppose such automation in the foodservice industry.
