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Smart Kitchen Summit

November 12, 2018

Video: Why We Should Care About Food Data

Why do we need a data structure for food?

It’s something that the consumer probably doesn’t know about it at all. In fact, if a company is doing their job right, they shouldn’t be aware of it at all. But this underlying layer of terms, analytics, and data plays a critical role in how we all find, cook, and consume food.

In this video from the 2018 Smart Kitchen Summit, Stacey Higgenbotham of Stacey on IoT moderates a deep-dive discussion into the “Internet of Food” with Matthew Lange of IC-Foods, Victor Penev of Edamam, and Kevin Brown of Innit. Watch below as the speakers get nerdy and tackle the importance of data standards to help us eat better food — and maybe live longer, too.

Food Data: Standards, Ontologies & Analytics

Look out for more videos of the panels, solo talks, and fireside chats from SKS 2018! We’ll be bringing them to you hot and fresh out the (smart) kitchen over the next few weeks.

November 11, 2018

Video: Smart Kitchen Perspectives from Japan, Europe, and the U.S.

More so than a living room, dining room, or even bedroom, kitchens — and their appliance lineup — vary dramatically region to region. In our global economy, how do companies in the smart kitchen space serve consumers across diverse geographies?

In this panel discussion from our recent Smart Kitchen Summit, ConnectSense’s Adam Justice moderates a discussion between Robin Liss of Suvie, Erik Wallin of Northfork, and Masa Fukata of Panasonic on the challenges of designing smart kitchen products and services which appeal to differing regions.

Smart Kitchen Regional Perspectives

Look out for more videos of the panels, solo talks, and fireside chats from SKS 2018! We’ll be bringing them to you hot and fresh out the (smart) kitchen over the next few weeks.

November 9, 2018

Video: Plant-Based, Cellular, and Sustainable — What is the Future of Meat?

Cell-based meat (also known as “clean” and “lab-grown” meat) is set to hit the market by the end of 2018, even though the FDA and USDA are still figuring out how to regulate it. At the same time, plant-based meat companies are seeing unprecedented levels of consumer interest and investment, even from Big Meat companies.

Watch as our panel from the 2018 Smart Kitchen Summit, featuring Tom Mastrobuoni of Tyson Ventures, Christie Lagally of Seattle Food Tech, and Thomas Bowman of JUST, Inc., explores the challenges and opportunities of the future of meat: plant-based, cell-based, and otherwise.

Plant-Based, Cellular & Sustainable: Exploring The Future of Meat

Look out for more videos of the panels, solo talks, and fireside chats from SKS 2018! We’ll be bringing them to you hot and fresh out the (smart) kitchen over the next few weeks.

November 8, 2018

Video: Rethinking Business Models in the Era of FoodTech

There was a time when Whirlpool was an appliance company, pure and simple. Nestlé focused exclusively on packaged goods. ChefSteps started as an online content community. But in the past few years, Whirlpool bought recipe content platform Yummly, Nestlé has added digital services, and Chefsteps has diversified into hardware and prepared food.

In the technology age, are the traditional roles of food companies breaking down?

Michael Wolf asked this question to Chris Young of ChefSteps, Stephanie Naegeli of Nestlé and Brett Dibkey of Whirlpool on the Smart Kitchen Summit stage. Watch the video below to see the panelists discuss how food companies are taking new, sometimes risky approaches in order to stay viable in the shifting smart kitchen ecosystem for years to come.

Rethinking Business Models In The Era of FoodTech

Look out for more videos of the panels, solo talks, and fireside chats from SKS 2018! We’ll be bringing them to you hot and fresh out the (smart) kitchen over the next few weeks.

November 7, 2018

To Video, and Beyond: The Future Recipe For Media, Food & Cooking

Question: What do you get when you take a celebrity chef, a video content creator, a food magazine legend, and a futurist, give them microphones, and put them on a stage?

Answer: This panel on the evolving food media space from the 2018 Smart Kitchen Summit.

Unlike a media room with a sofa and bean bag chair, the kitchen is a space for participatory media: guided cooking videos, voice assistants, or printed recipes. Former Editor in Chief of Food & Wine Dana Cowin sat down with Project Foodie’s Eli Holzman, chef Tyler Florence, and forward-thinking inventor/futurist Dhairya Dand to explore how new (and old) media can combine storytelling and utility to help people cook better, and have more fun doing it. Watch the video below to hear how these tastemakers, with very diverse entry points into the food world, see the role of media in the smart kitchen space.

Fusion Cooking: The Future Recipe For Media, Food & Cooking

Look out for more videos of the panels, solo talks, and fireside chats from SKS 2018! We’ll be bringing them to you hot and fresh out the (smart) kitchen over the next few weeks.

November 5, 2018

From Project Runway to Project Foodie: Eli Holzman on The Power of Kitchen Video

A year after Eli Holzman first created Project Runway, he called Parson’s School of Design to see how the partnership was going from them. They told that enrollment in their program had doubled. In fact, across the country, there had been a massive uptick in applications for fashion design schools. That’s when Holzman first realized what a powerful medium television — and video — could be.

Cut to a few years later, when he was trying to cook a recipe from his brother (chef of The Meatball Shop). “I just made a mess of it,” he said. So he decided to send a crew to videotape his brother making the recipe and use it as a guide to cook along in his own kitchen. He had such success that the brothers decided to launch Project Foodie: an app with real-time video recipes meant to be a foolproof guide for home cooks.

Our own Chris Albrecht sat down with Holzman on the Smart Kitchen Summit 2018 stage to talk about his experience transitioning into a new form of media in the kitchen: the unexpected production challenges, his new success metrics, and his vision for the future of cooking video content.

Watch the full video below:

From Project Runway To Project Foodie

Look out for more videos of the panels, solo talks, and fireside chats from SKS 2018! We’ll be bringing them to you hot and fresh out the (smart) kitchen over the next few weeks.

October 26, 2018

Video: Richard Blais Wants to Make a Drone Delivery Service for Donuts

During his fireside chat at the 2018 Smart Kitchen Summit, Richard Blais compared the state of food technology to something it has probably never been compared to ever before. “There’s this Biggie/Tupac thing happening in food always,” he said, using the most famous rap rivalry of all time to reflect the current tension in restaurants: old world vs. new, low-tech vs. high-tech, woodfire grills vs. robots.

Despite his culinary pedigree, Blais embraces technology in the kitchen — at least, when it can make things easier for him. At the same time, he doesn’t want robots to take over everything in the kitchen. Repetitive tasks (hello, french fry preparation), sure. Donuts delivered via drone? You betcha. (That’s a real business idea, by the way — and he’s going to call it the Dronut.)

Inviting technology into the kitchen is a delicate balancing act, though. In the end, Blais is open to most things — as long as food tastes awesome. “That’s the ultimate judge,” he said. “Is that thing delicious?”

Watch the full video of Richard Blais’ fireside chat (and find out his dairy-based DJ name) below.

Richard Blais at Smart Kitchen Summit

Look out for more videos of the panels, solo talks, and fireside chats from SKS 2018! We’ll be bringing them to you hot and fresh out the (smart) kitchen over the next few weeks.

October 25, 2018

Video: To Survive, the Future Kitchen Must be Personalized, Flexible, and Emotional

The first panel of the 2018 Smart Kitchen Summit (SKS) North America started out not with a bang, but with a beep. Just after Jon Jenkins, Director of Engineering at Hestan Smart Cooking, Dana Cowin, former Editor in Chief of Food & Wine, and Michael Wolf got settled, self-driving robot Penny glided out onto the stage to bring them some water.

This little interruption was actually the perfect way to introduce their panel: The Disrupted Meal Journey. As automation edges its way further and further into our lives and our food, how will that transform the kitchen? Will people still cook in the future, or will they opt purely for food delivery — or just have a robot cook their meal for them?

Don’t worry. The panelists were confident that the kitchen wasn’t going to fully disappear: as long as it could use technology not only to make cooking easier, but also more exciting and emotional.

“If what we’re selling is purely sustenance, you don’t need a kitchen,” Jenkins stated. “We’ve got to hope we’re getting something more out of cooking.” Cowin agreed, adding that home meal preparation should leverage technology to become more “personalized, exciting, and diverse.”

Watch the video below to see the full panel, and hear Cowin and Jenkins’ predictions on how kitchens will have to adjust to survive in the age of ever-growing automation and delivery.

The Disrupted Meal Journey

Look out for more videos of the panels, solo talks, and fireside chats from SKS 2018! We’ll be bringing them to you hot and fresh out the (smart) kitchen over the next few weeks.

October 18, 2018

One Year Later: We Check in with Verdical, Winner of the SKS2017 Startup Showcase

Last year indoor grow system Verdical beat our 14 other food innovation companies and took home the trophy at the 2017 Smart Kitchen Summit (SKS) Startup Showcase. CEO Andrew Deitz pitched onstage about how Verdical’s indoor platform for hydroponic gardening would allow restaurants, hotels, cafeterias, and more to grow greens and herbs in their own kitchen, making fresh produce more accessible year-round while reducing food travel and waste.

When we left them last year, Verdical had just won a $10,000 cash prize and was gearing up to “revolutionize kitchens across the nation.” This week I checked in with Deitz to see where the startup is, one year on.

A Verdical grow system inside Jardiniere.

Customers
Verdical now has four customers, all in the Bay Area: Michelin-starred restaurant Jardiniere, 25-store pizza chain Pizza My Heart, the Marin Country Day School, and Berkeley dining spot Saha. All in all, there are 17 Verdical units currently in the field (so to speak).

Though he wouldn’t give details, Deitz also said that Verdical would soon be expanding outside the Bay Area with national — and even global — customers.

Like most other indoor grow systems on the market, Verdical currently offers just herbs and microgreens. This certainly limits what they can provide, but they’re experimenting within the boundaries. For example, at Jardiniere Verdical isn’t just growing garden-variety (ha) basil. Instead, they developed seed pods for things like gem marigold, wasabi mustard, and blue Ethiopian mustard. “We’re providing unique, highly-differentiated stuff that they couldn’t get other places, but can grow right here,” said Deitz.

Starting at $200 per month, customers get the Verdical hardware unit, all the plants they can grow, and access to the Verdical App that controls the growing platform, manages inventory, and provides education about new ingredients. According to Deitz, the price is cost neutral to the current herb and microgreen spend of their customers. Since Verdical works with everyone from a school to a Michelin-starred restaurant, I would imagine their monthly spend on microgreens and herbs varies pretty wildly, but Deitz said it’s actually surprisingly consistent.

Funding
This year Tabard VC, a food and agtech venture capital firm, invested an undisclosed amount in Verdical. Several angel investors have also funded the startup, though Deitz wouldn’t disclose details.

Partners
Verdical has teamed up with TE Connectivity, using the tech company’s sensors to monitor humidity, moisture, external temperature, water level, and water quality in their grow units. The two connected at the SKS last year and have been building a partnership together ever since. Verdical started using TE sensors in their early prototypes six months ago. “We helped them figure out how to better partner with startups,” said Deitz. “And they’re helping us figure out how to connect from the field all the way into somebody’s stomach.”

Verdical CEO Andrew Dietz with the TE Connectivity team at SKS 2018.

Competition

Since last year’s Smart Kitchen Summit, quite a few companies have made strides to bring indoor grow systems to restaurants. Farmery also installs indoor hydroponic grow units in restaurants. Farmshelf recently put one of their hydroponic mini-farms in a New York Oath Pizza location. On a slightly larger scale, but Freight Farms installs and manages indoor farms in shipping containers for use in corporate cafeterias and more. And that’s not even taking into account companies working on residential or large-scale indoor farms.

While he wasn’t sure about the growing mechanics of other indoor farming systems, Deitz was confident that Verdical would distinguish itself from the pack with its agtech. “We’re innovative because we’re growing with a soil-based medium,” he explained. By harnessing the water purifying and nutrient delivery powers of soil, he claims they can grow produce more efficiently. He also told me that using soil is a safer bet than going with hydro or aquaponics: that way, even if there’s a power outage, the plants can still get what they need to survive.

Deitz, however, doesn’t think that on-site indoor farming is zero-sum game. “The market is so big, it’ll take us a while to bump into each other,” he said, referring to Verdical’s competitors.

What’s next?
According to Deitz, Verdical will soon be announcing new customers and expanded partnerships (we’ll keep you updated). But as they grow, the company will continue to focus on its original goal: connecting people to their food source. “That’s where you can see a shift in consciousness,” he said. Until then, if you’re in the Bay Area, drop in on one of Verdical’s restaurant customers and taste fresh-picked some exotic microgreens.

October 16, 2018

Scenes from SKS2018: Runner Robots, 3D Printing, Celebrity Chefs, and More

It’s been one week since the fourth annual Smart Kitchen Summit (SKS) in North America, and we’re still processing all the incredible discussions we heard, futuristic foods we tasted, and inspiring people we met. This year, we had over 50 panels, solo talks, and fireside chats; 13 talented young companies pitching at our Startup Showcase; and one very photogenic food-running robot.

Here’s a quick look back at some of the highlights from the two-day event. Look out for panel videos coming soon!

Michael Wolf welcomes everyone to the fourth SKS North America

Bear Robotics’ food-running robot Penny makes a surprise visit to the stage.

Tom Mastrobuoni, Carmen Palafox, and Brian Frank discuss investment in food tech.


We had over 30 exhibitors show off their companies on the SKS floor.

13 new foodtech companies pitched at our Startup Showcase.

Jasmine Crowe of Goodr at the Smart Kitchen Summit 2019.

3D printed “flavor bursts” from NuFood at our Future Food Court.

Pablos Holman thinks that 3D printing of food can save the world.

Tyler Florence returns to the SKS stage to talk recipes, grocery, and social media.

Food storage company Silo comes out of stealth mode.

Malachy Moynihan of Amazon Echo and Juicero discusses product success — and failure.

Blockchain may be a buzzword, but how will it shape the food system?

Futurist Dhairya Dand invented shoes with a built-in GPS.

What will the future of food media look like?

Amy Gross of VineSleuth tells us to stop bullying the consumer in her Final Five talk.

We have a winner! Soggy Food Sucks took home the Startup Showcase trophy.

Thanks to all who helped make SKS such a huge success! Next up, we’re headed to Vegas: we’ll be putting on the first (and only) foodtech event at CES 2019 — drop us a line if you want to get involved!

October 15, 2018

SKS 2018: A Growing Community Accomplishing Big Things

Every year after Smart Kitchen Summit, I do a couple things:

  1. Catch up on sleep.
  2. Process and distill all the insights, conversations and connections made during the past few days.

And this year, with over 600 attendees, 80 speakers and 30 sponsors at our flagship food tech event, there were a whole lot of interesting ideas to digest.

So now that I’ve caught up on sleep, I wanted to share some of the lessons I learned during these action-packed two days.  While I will no doubt continue to connect the dots from the lessons learned last week — and gain additional insights as I watch the videos of the sessions I missed (stay tuned for those!) — here are some early observations about the trends on display at SKS 2018:

Products are shipping

Onlookers check out the second generation June oven

At the first SKS in 2015, many of the early conversations were about next-gen cooking devices that had yet to ship. Compare that to today where companies like June are on their second generation product, and big appliance brands have deep integrations with software platforms from the likes of Innit and SideChef, and we are seeing a market that is less about theory and more about what happens when you put these products in the hands of actual consumers.

Innovation across the food system is interconnected

While some conversations about the future of the kitchen may start with looking at connected appliances, SKS showed us the future of food and cooking spans new delivery formats, AI & robotics, food retail, home design and much more.

We heard from startups making AI platforms to create highly personalized new flavors for CPG companies. Executives from restaurants, big food, appliance, and software companies talked about how their companies are taking part in a rapidly changing meal journey. We heard from home designers working with technology providers to create new kitchens that incorporate intelligence within the fabric of the home.

The big takeaway here is that all of these stops along the journey to the plate are not isolated, but part of a bigger interdependent whole.

Business models are crystalizing

The Wall Street Journal’s Wilson Rothman talks to Malachy Moynihan

One of the biggest challenges in new markets is figuring out how companies will make money. Because of this, at this year’s SKS we dug deep into how business models are changing with a bunch of amazing talks and conversations from those forging a new path. We heard from the President of BSH Appliances about transitioning one of the world’s largest appliance makers to a services-oriented company, from ChefSteps on the path to becoming a food delivery company, and about lessons learned by the former head of product behind both the original Amazon Echo and the Juicero.

After hearing from these leaders on stage and discussing their business models in the hallways and backstage, I’m am convinced those pioneering the future of food are figuring out new and unique approaches that are informed by the past — but break conventions when and where necessary.

Existing markets morph slowly (with occasional ‘big bang’ jolts of innovation)

One thing I try to keep in mind is markets don’t change overnight. Existing product categories  — whether they are packaged food, appliances, restaurants or retailers — evolve as new alchemies of technology, business model innovation, societal changes, and company cultures bring about long-term change to a given market.

Pablos Holman talks about the future of 3D printed food

Occasionally, however innovation evolution is catalyzed by those that help us see into the future, and this year at SKS we heard about a few of these big-bang jolts of innovation. Whether it starts with a maker who hacked together a home sous vide circulator in 2012, a serial inventor working in a well-funded research lab where he convinces Nathan Myhrvold of potential of our 3D printed food future or Amazon’s reimagining the future of the grocery store, we were shown the potential of accelerating innovation through singular visions.

Innovation is happening globally

Hirotaka Tanaka talks about Japan’s food tech market

We took our event international last year with Smart Kitchen Summit Japan, and this year we went fully global by taking the event to Europe. This global nature was on display in Seattle this week with startups from all over the globe showcasing their ideas and products, appliance and food goliaths sponsoring our event, and speakers from all over the world discussing their ideas on stage

We are exploring stories at SKS and The Spoon

One of the realizations I’ve had since starting the Smart Kitchen Summit in 2015 is that our job is to help food innovators share their stories. We do that throughout the year by telling stories at The Spoon of creators doing exciting work. We also engage in conversations with them on our podcasts where we can learn more about their work.

We also like to have the stories we discover shared from the SKS stage. Stories resonate most when shared by the person who lived it, and it’s through thoughtful conversation, questions, and connections that new chapters are added.

Thanks to all those who made SKS 2018 possible and a special thanks for those who came to SKS and shared your story. For the rest of you, we can’t wait to hear your story, share it with our community, and maybe even have you on stage for SKS 2019!

Got a good food tech story to tell? Let us know.  And if you want to participate in our FoodTech Live at CES, drop us a line. 

October 12, 2018

Which Smart Appliances Will Survive the Kitchen Countertopacolypse?

You could see the growth of our Smart Kitchen Summit this year just by looking at the sponsor section. Back in 2015, the sponsor area was a few tabletops scattered around the back of the room. Four years later, we had an entire promenade featuring three demo kitchens with full appliances and a host of smaller startups.

Among those showing off their wares were: June, Brava, Markov and the Rotimatic. These are all sizeable countertop cooking devices that are too big and bulky to store in a pantry or shelf, so they have to be semi-permanent fixtures on your kitchen counter. Which got me thinking, how many appliances can one kitchen fit?

Because it’s not just those companies vying for your counter space. There’s also: Tovala, Suvie, Amazon’s Microwave, Bartesian, Picobrew U, and Breville’s new Pizzaiolo, not to mention whatever coffee maker you have, a stand mixer, and maybe a food processor or blender.

Phew!

That doesn’t even include the amount of counter space you need just to prepare food. A quick search shows that the average kitchen only has 26 to 30 square feet of workable countertop space. My June alone takes up 2.6 square feet, almost a tenth of the square footage for an average American countertop.

At least the June does multiple things (oven, toaster, heaven-sent re-heater of pizza). As much as I’d love a Rotimatic, I can’t quite justify the counter space (or the $1,000) for something that only makes flatbread. Same goes for the Pizzaiolo.

The Brava and the Markov are interesting because of the new technologies they bring to traditional devices (light and AI, respectively), so they at least have the potential to change how we cook and replace existing devices.

But will these new appliances attract sizeable enough audiences? Will they achieve such a level of permanence in our cooking life that we will change the way kitchens are architected?

I rarely use my traditional oven, but I can’t imagine a kitchen without one. Perhaps that’s just my age showing, but it seems like we’ll always have the big, bulky, cooktop + oven combo (if not two ovens) and a fridge, and work out from there. Then again, maybe countertop induction burners can replace a traditional cooktop as well, allowing you to cook anywhere in the kitchen (and freeing up counter space!).

But who knows, the kitchen as we know it may be dying. Perhaps between more on-demand delivery of groceries and restaurant food, and the potential rise of prepared meal kits in supermarkets, we just won’t need the traditional appliances that we grew up with. Maybe the space once reserved for our oven(s) can now be freed up for something else, something more unitasking like a Rotimatic or a dedicated pizza device.

The point of all this is, is that there are a lot of devices coming to market, and none of them are cheap. In the case of the kitchen, it is a zero sum game. The addition of one device means less room for another, so when the kitchen counteropocalypse comes, there will be winners and losers.

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