The News

Looks like Pudu Robotics’ BellaBot server robot has clocked in at McDonald’s in Slovenia. Pudu posted a brief, detail-free announcement on Linkedin yesterday saying:

“Wow!! Pudu Robotics x McDonald's in Slovenia! Go the stores to meet #BellaBot and enjoy the service!”

Pudu’s BellaBot is an autonomous server robot, featuring racks of trays that can carry food to tables and empty dishes/containers/whatever to the back of house. While there are a number of server robots from the likes of Keenon and Bear Robotics coming to market, the BellaBot sets itself apart because of its cute and disarming cat-shaped “face” complete with pointy ears. You can even “pet” the robot to make it smile.

We reached out to Pudu to see which McDonald’s in Slovenia will sport new BellaBots and how many will be in service, etc. and will update this post once we hear back.

Why This Matters

BellaBot’s Slovenian debut is the second McDonald’s deployment for the server bot that we know about. A video posted to Facebook in June of this year shows the robot rolling around a Mickey D’s in Shenzhen, China. Could this be the start of a wider implementation?