Batch Management and Control - Meals Prepared by Robotics in Boston

I recently had lunch at a relatively new establishment in Boston’s South End called “Spyce”.  This (literally) fast food restaurant is unique in that, instead of seeing human cooks behind the counter mixing ingredients and cooking your meal to order, a series of spinning metal bowls controlled by batch management and control software and performed by robotics technology take the orders and prepare the meals.  According to the Boston.eater.com website article students at MIT in Cambridge, Massachusetts came up with the idea to use robotic automation to prepare fast food.  However, while it was certainly was nice to see lots of shiny technology operating behind the counter, I was disappointed that there were no visible robots.

No Visible Robot – Just Batch Management and Control

The “robotics” used to prepare your meal are actually very similar to what the process automation industry would refer to as “batch management and control”.  Although this would not be considered an earth-shaking development in the process manufacturing industries, in the fast food industry it represents a large step forward.  The combination of touchscreens to take the customer order and the robotic software and hardware to prepare the meal minimizes or eliminates many of the potential health problems and other human errors that other fast food eateries have experienced recently.  The fully automated process that drives the customer order entry to the “robots” emptying the mixer/cooker into the bowl for the customer is not touched by human hands.  Furthermore, the process sequence includes the cleaning steps between orders.

People are Still Essential

For those who worry that “robots” are taking away jobs that people do now, just consider the nearby “fast casual” eatery, Chipotle, that serves similar Mexican-style meals.  This chain has a lot of visible food preparers behind the counter, most working for minimum wage.  In contrast, it’s likely that Spyce has more (and higher paid) technology personnel than Chipotle, since it needs technicians that can install, configure, and maintain the technology driving their operation.  The automation technicians and engineers, are of course, not visible in the restaurant – unless they happen to drop in to order some great-tasting, robotically cooked meals.

ARC has researched both batch management and control and robotics for a long time.  If this post inspires you to rethink how you might take advantage of modern approaches such as the creators of Spyce have done, please contact us.  Or check out some of our Technology Selection Guides for possible inspiration.