Video: See Aitme's All-in-One Robot Kitchen Kiosk in Action
The machine costs between $3,900 and $5,600 per month, depending on the agreement.
Aitme showed off its fully-autonomous robot restaurant kiosk via a new promotional video posted to Linkedin today. The slickly produced video (see above↑) shows the machine dispensing rice and vegetables, heating and rotating food in induction cooking bowls and two robotic arms that move your meal from assembly to packaging and into a cubby for pickup.
Based in Berlin, Aitme (pronounced eye-t-may) makes the all-in-one autonomous kitchen. According to the company’s website, Aitme is “Plug and Play,” needing only water and electricity at installation. The unit is just about 10 sq. meters (~107 sq. ft.), and based on the menu, can cook up to 120 meals per hour. Aitme’s central kitchen prepares the ingredients, which are stored fresh (not frozen) in the machine. Aitme also features a patented and TÜV-tested plasma technology to clean exhausted air without any residues.
Like other autonomous kitchen kiosks in the space, Aitme offers a number of bowl-style foods, filled with grains/pasta, vegetables and proteins. The company has a human chef on staff to develop meals and menus specific to the robot’s capabilities.
There are a actually a number of fully-autonomous kitchen kiosks coming to market right now. In addition to Aitme, Karakuri, SJW Robotics, YPC Technologies, RobotEatz, and Mezli are all developing similar all-in-one robot kiosks. And just a couple weeks back, Wavemaker Labs partnered with restaurant platform C3 to launch Nommi.
When I spoke with Aitme earlier this year, the company’s target market was corporate cafeterias. COVID and its subsequent variant waves have kept many offices closed, or at least severely diminished, negating the need for a full-time cafeteria staff. For offices that are open or opening, self-contained robot kitchen kiosks allows businesses to offer fresh meals to employees around the clock without needing to staff up or build out a cafeteria, and meals are served in a contactless way.
We saw such an installation at the end of September in the U.K., when Ocado set up Karakuri’s Semblr robot in its corporate cafeteria. Ocado employees could order and customize meals ahead of time via mobile app and pick them up from a cubby in the robot.
Aitme offers its robot for either a long-term lease or shorter term rental. A five-year agreement costs €3,500/month (~$3,900 USD) plus a €1,000 setup fee (~$1,100 USD). A rental costs €5,000/month (~$5,600 USD) plus a €2,000 (~$2,200 USD) setup fee.
In the same Linkedin post, Aitme said that it is shipping a unit similar to the one in the video to be installed at the AI Campus Berlin right now.