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The Spoon

Daily news and analysis about the food tech revolution

Connected Kitchen

Smarter Launches Software Platform for Appliances, Partners with Electrolux for New Fridge Cam PLUS

London-based connected appliance company Smarter announced the launch of its new “Powered by Smarter” software platform for appliance makers at the IFA show in Berlin today. The company also announced a partnership with Electrolux for its new Fridge Cam PLUS, which will run on the Powered by Smarter platform.

According to Smarter’s website, the Powered by Smarter platform offers small, pre-configured chipsets that can be integrated to “power almost any sensor, product, interface, protocol, or functional requirement to connect your devices.” Smarter then provides “device firmware and software execution, hardware interfacing, cloud connectivity, and remote device management for your product.”

Additionally, Powered by Smarter will offer appliance Smarter Assist, an AI-powered object recognition system for refrigerator replenishment, and Smarter Analytics for targeted marketing based on insights into consumer behavior. Powered by Smarter devices will also feature support for Siri, Alexa and If This Then That (IFTTT) and other systems.

One of the devices Powered by Smarter is the new FridgeCam PLUS, launched in partnership with AEG/Electrolux. The FridgeCam PLUS builds on Smarter’s previous FridgeCam, which was a camera that could be retrofitted into any fridge allowing you to remotely check on its contents via mobile app.

The new FridgeCam PLUS features a wider and higher-resolution image, as well as SmarterAssist, so it can recognize items in your fridge. The accompanying app, which is new, gives users an inventory of their fridge, an expiration date tracker, shopping lists and automated links for item re-stocking through Tesco and Amazon Fresh in the UK.

The press materials provided didn’t disclose pricing or availability details other than saying “Now with FridgeCam PLUS and Electrolux, users will have the benefit of a smaller, more accessible device that will be available in thousands of appliances across Europe.”

Beko Unveils New Fridge Tech That Supposedly Makes Your Produce Healthier

Electronics brand and appliance maker Beko claims it has found a way to keep fruits and vegetables fresher and their nutrients intact when you store them in the fridge. The company today unveiled its HarvestFresh three-color technology at IFA 2019, Europe’s largest consumer electronics show.

Developed to go into Beko fridges, the technology recreates the 24-hour sun cycle in your refrigerator using combinations of blue, red, and green lights to mimic natural sunlight as well as “times of darkness,” according to a press release. The company says that doing so preserves Vitamin A and C levels in the produce, making them more nutritious when it comes time for eating: “By utilizing the power of varying light combination, fruits and vegetables are exposed to a natural way of preserving the vitamin, encouraging a healthier diet.”

A few details about the technology remain unclear, including whether consumers can program the light “recipe” themselves and if the light combo can adjust (with or without the consumer’s help) based on the types of produce in the fridge. According to the Beko press release, product testing and certification company Intertek tested the HarvestFresh tech in a lab on tomatoes and green peppers over a seven-day period. With such a limited timeframe and sampling of produce, it’s hard to say how effective this technology would be if used around the clock for months on end on a wide range of household produce.

Still, the idea of using light combinations to preserve and optimize produce — which is also a core element of vertical farming — is worth watching for the role it could potentially play not just in maintaining more nutrients in produce but also in preserving food for longer and in doing so cutting back on food waste in the home.

HarvestFresh technology will be available in select Beko fridges in 2020.

Wireless Power Consortium Announces Ki Standard for Cordless Kitchen Power

The Wireless Power Consortium (WPC) today announced that its wireless power standard for kitchen appliances will be called Ki (pronounced “key”).

Wireless power in the kitchen would deliver just that, the ability to run appliances like coffee makers and toasters without the use of cords. With the Ki system, power transmitters are hidden under countertops and up to 2.2kW of electricity is delivered when Ki-compatible devices are placed on top of them.

From the WPC press release:

The Ki Cordless Kitchen standard works with any non-metal countertop or table surface, including marble, slate, granite, laminates, wood and many others. Enabled appliances communicate with the transmitter through near-field communication (NFC), a safe, inexpensive and pervasive technology currently used around the world in bankcards, door locks, passports, transport tickets, and more.

For safety, power does not transmit when other objects like keys or phones are placed on top of charging areas. This means that when not in use for powering devices, Ki-enabled countertops can be used for food preparation or eating.

You can see Ki wireless power in action in this Wireless Power Consortium video:

WPC Ki Cordless Kitchen Video

If the name “Ki” looks/sounds familiar, that’s because the WPC had previously developed the Qi wireless standard for charging things like mobile phones. The Qi standard is now part of 4,500 certified products in use today.

The WPC isn’t the only company working on wireless power. Powercast uses radio frequencies to wirelessly charge and power devices over the air.

The WPC said that its Ki-powered cordless kitchen will be on display at its booth at the IFA show in Berlin this week.

If Berlin is too far, you will also be able to see Ki in action next month at the Smart Kitchen Summit.

Anova Launches New Smaller, Lighter Sous Vide Precision Cooker

Anova announced a new version of its Precision Cooker sous vide wand via a corporate blog post yesterday.

The new version of the Anova Precision Cooker is two inches smaller and 20 percent lighter than the older version and unlike the Anova Nano, it has wifi connectivity. The company also claims the device is more durable and provides better connectivity than the previous version. The new sous vide wand is available for pre-order right now for $129 (which the company says is $70 less than the retail price).

The first Anova Precision Cooker launched in 2014 and was among the initial wave of devices, along with ChefSteps and Nomiku, that kicked off a sous vide mini-boom. With the advent of a circulating wand that could attach to any pot of water and be controlled via mobile app, a full-fledged countertop sous vide machine was no longer necessary.

But this year that mini-boom has given way to turmoil. ChefSteps went through layoffs and product cancellations before finally being acquired by Breville. A spat between Nomiku CEO founder Lisa Fetterman and Anova CEO Steve Svajian over idea theft went public earlier this summer.

But Anova, which was bought by Electolux, carries on. In addition to new hardware, Anova also recently released a new version of its mobile app, which controls its devices.

With the introduction of the new Precision Cooker, Anova is no longer making the older version of its device. The blog post said that the company would still support it, but it was putting remaining inventory on a fire sale. But when we went to check out the price, the devices were already sold out.

Cookpad Has 100M Active Monthly Users, Broadens into Original Hardware Design with a Hard/Soft Water Device

Cookpad, the Tokyo-based global recipe hosting site, revealed that it is developing its own hardware design ambitions with a new connected hard and soft water dispensing device called Oicy Water.

Oicy Water, which is still very much in the prototype phase, was unveiled at the Smart Kitchen Summit: Japan today. It works by affixing a bottle of hard water and a bottle of soft water to the top of the machine. Controls on the device as well as an accompanying mobile app allow you to control the hardness of the water you’ll cook with by mixing the contents of the two bottles as it dispenses.

You may know on some level the difference between hard and soft water—hard water contains minerals like calcium and magnesium, and soft water is treated and the only ions in there are sodium. It turns out, however, that whether you use hard or soft water can impact the flavor of what you cook. This is where Cookpad’s device could come in handy.

While it’s still a ways off, Cookpad’s plan is to fine tune recipes on its site with precise hardness controls. Let’s say you are making a pasta, a Cookpad recipe could tell you to boil it in water that is 20 percent hard water. Eventually, that digital recipe will talk with the water device and automatically dispense the exact amount of water with the proper hardness recommended.

The Oicy Water is the first piece of hardware designed internally at Coopad and is part of Cookpad’s larger plan of being at the center of a connected kitchen. Last year it launched its “Oicy” initiative at our Smart Kitchen Summit: Europe. As we wrote at that time:

OiCy (pronounced “oh-ee-shee”, which is a roughly translates to “おいしい,” the Japanese word for delicious), will take recipes uploaded to Cookpad’s site and turns them into a machine-readable format that connected appliances can understand.

So if you were trying to make a particular Cookpad spaghetti recipe, OiCy would pull data from the recipe, and “talk” to different connected appliances you might have in your kitchen and guide you each step of the way. Depending on the number and type of appliances you’d have, it would automatically boil your water, tell you when to add/remove pasta, dispense seasonings, etc..

This is actually the second hardware device that Cookpad has been associated with, the first being the Oicy Taste, which is a connected seasoning dispenser (it’s design didn’t originate at Cookpad). It’s easy to see how both of these devices play into the overall ecosystem Cookpad wants to create. By having a Cookpad recipe “talk” with appliances, users can automate the process of portioning out the right water, at the right hardness level and amount and type of seasoning — allowing them to focus more on the actual act of cooking.

This communication with devices doesn’t just help the end user to cook; it can also help Cookpad fine tune its recipes. As connected machines dispense precise amounts of ingredients, they will report back to Cookpad how much of an ingredient is dispensed. So if enough users don’t like the result of a particular recipe, Cookpad can track the aberrations in the amounts of various ingredients used.

In order to be truly useful, Cookpad will need to collect a lot of data from users on how they like or dislike recipes. But amassing a data set that big is something the company is already well on its way to creating. Cookpad says it has roughly 100 million active monthly users across 72 countries and 29 languages. Further, Cookpad has two million users paying $3 a month to access premium features. That’s a revenue run rate of $72 million a year.

Cookpad wanting to design a hardware system from the ground up makes sense, as they can tailor a device to their software. The harder question to answer, at least for the Oicy Water in the U.S., will be how many people actually care about the hardness of their water enough to buy bottles of soft water?

This article has been updated to say “roughly 100 million active subscribers,” and earlier version said “more than.”

Cinder Launches Chef Partnership Program

Cinder, the precision countertop grill that was saved from extinction by Desora, announced today that it is launching a new Chef Partnership Program, which will make Cinder-specific recipes available through the Cinder mobile app and website.

The Chef Partnership Program will feature recipes developed by Michelin starred chef John Critchley, who is Head Chef of Culinary Innovation at Chew (which Spoon readers might remember as the company that was going to — but then decided not to — take over the shuttered PilotWorks location in Brooklyn).

The Cinder is a unique device in the connected kitchen world that combines sous vide and conductive cooking. It’s a big machine that looks like a George Foreman grill on steroids that cooks food with precise temperate control. But unlike a typical sous vide circulator, the Cinder can also ratchet up the hot plates to sear as well.

According to the press announcement, the recipes “are meant to highlight Cinder’s unique Sous-Vide and grilling capabilities.” Critchley’s recipes have been designed exclusively for the Cinder grill, and users can expect a new recipe every week. The company will also be adding recipes from more chefs to the program throughout the year.

Access to these recipes will be free to all existing Cinder customers. Michel Maalouly, Co-Founder and CEO of Desora, told me via email that eventually the “recipes and resources” from the Chef Partnership Program will become a paid subscription service. All existing Cinder customers will be grandfathered into the program free of charge.

As part of today’s announcement, Desora also said that the company has released an all-new Android app for the Cinder that “now guides users through every step of the cooking process, from ingredient selection to food preparation.” An iOS update will arrive in the next few months.

Both Spoon founder Mike Wolf and I have tested the Cinder and found it to cook steaks perfectly. It’s bulky and heavy, and because it’s using precision cooking it’s not a fast way to prepare a protein, but the results are tasty. Now we’ll have to try the new recipes to see how easy they are to prepare.

PicoBrew Goes Coffee-First With New ‘Brew Computer’, The Pico MultiBrew

PicoBrew, the Seattle based startup that’s made a name for itself with countertop beer brewing appliances, has set its sites on a different type of beverage with its newest product, the Pico MultiBrew: coffee.

In short, PicoBrew has taken the technology it has developed over the past decade for high-precision beer brewing and applied it to making the perfect cup of joe. The MultiBrew will use what the company calls “brew programs” to govern the time, temperature and fluid flow of each coffee brew.

If that sounds like a very high tech approach to coffee brewing, that’s because it is. This shouldn’t be all that surprising since PicoBrew’s founding trio includes a couple of former Microsoft execs and a food scientist.

“We’re ex-software guys and computer guys, as well as coffee and beer guys,” CEO Bill Mitchell told me last week when we visited the PicoBrew offices near the University of Washington to take a peek at the MultiBrew prototype. “So it made sense for us to start with the hardest drink [with] beer and go from there.”

While the MultiBrew is the first ‘coffee-first’ machine from PicoBrew, it isn’t the first that makes coffee. In fact, Mitchell’s brother Jim (a PicoBrew cofounder and a food scientist by training) started making coffee with their very first appliance, the Zymatic, and both the PicoBrew Z (pro unit) and Pico C (consumer) can make cold brew.

And then there’s the Pico U, the multi-beverage brewing appliance the company unveiled in the spring of 2018 and ultimately pulled the plug on even after hitting their Kickstarter funding target.  According to Mitchell, what they heard from their community was that while they liked the Pico U’s ability to make multiple types of drinks like coffee, beer and kombucha, ultimately the U wasn’t coffee-forward enough.

“Coffee, coffee, coffee is what we were told,” said Mitchell.

And so unlike the PicoBrew U — which looked like a scaled down version of the Pico C — the MultiBrew looks and acts like a coffee maker, allowing the user to brew different sizes ranging from single serve to a full carafe of coffee. The MultiBrew also lets users brew using their own coffee grounds or from pods that are made of the same compostable pulp paper material as with the Pico’s beer-ingredient packaging, the PicoPaks.

While I’ve given up on Keurig because coffee from pods generally tastes bad (not to mention all the plastic waste), PicoBrew has a spin on coffee pods that could make me reconsider. Not only are they are designing their own (compostable) pods that will not only apply precision parameters specifically designated by the coffee’s roaster, but are also designing the pods to mimic pourover brew methods rather than the brute force heated water injection method used by a typical pod-brew system.

Mitchell showed me a prototype of a MultiBrew brewpod with an laser-cut pattern through which the water will be poured on the coffee (photo below).

Similar to the way the company worked closely with craft brewers to create ingredients for PicoPaks, they are now in discussions with a variety of craft coffee makers about the possibility of cobranded coffee pods for the MultiBrew.  Unlike Keurig, which tightly controls the supply of coffee that goes into their coffee pods, PicoBrew is telling smaller roasters they can both provide roasted beans for their high tech system as well as optimized brewing parameters for the specific roast.

With all this emphasis on coffee, it should be noted that the MultBrew is true to its name and does brew drinks other than coffee ranging from kombucha to golden milk to, yes, beer. The MultiBrew will allow users to brew beer using the same kegs as the Pico C by putting the keg directly under the dispense mechanism (rather than using plastic tubing of the Pico C).

While the multi-drink capability of the MultiBrew does makes it stand apart from other high-tech coffee machines on the market, will it be enough? There’s certainly lots of competition in the high-tech coffee space, as companies like SharkNinja have sold millions of the Ninja Coffee Bar while newer entrants like the Terra Kaffe are in market with products that not only can grind coffee, but can make espresso and milk-based coffee drinks using highly-tailored brewing parameters.

We will see soon enough. The MultiBrew, which will be priced “in the same range” as the machines like the Ninja Coffee Bar (below $200), will be available for preorder in the fall and will ship in 2020.

June to Release Software Update to Prevent Accidental Oven Preheating

UPDATE: A little more than a week after we broke this story, The Verge wrote a story of its own which garnered a lot of attention. In the wake of increased press scrutiny, June sent us the following statement.

Safety of our product is June’s number one priority, and the company took a number of precautions in the production of the June oven. We have worked directly and quickly with the few June owners who have experienced accidental preheat. These instances are concerning for sure, and we have a team of engineers working to ensure this doesn’t happen in the future. We have had ovens deployed in the market for 4 years now and have a large passionate community. The best-case scenario is hearing from customers in real time, like June does, to address any issues as they arise.

OUR ORIGINAL POST:

One of the things I like about the June oven is that it shuts off when I’m done cooking, so an OCD-esque person like myself doesn’t have to worry about it being on when I leave my home. But evidently, a couple of June users discovered that their smart ovens were accidentally preheating on their own, without being turned on by a user.

Having an oven turn on and heat up all by itself without the user knowing — or being home — is obviously bad. So June Co-Founder and CEO, Matt Van Horn, took to Facebook this week to let owners know that a fix is on the way.

When you open the June mobile app, there is an option to preheat your oven with the tap of a button. This could be helpful if you’re busy outside or on your way home from work, so the oven is ready to go when you get home. But in both of these scenarios, the user understands what is happening, and is actively instructing the oven to turn on. “The majority of our customers really like this feature,” Van Horn told me in a phone interview this week.

However, two different June owners posted messages, one as recently as July 28, on the Official June Owners Facebook page about their ovens accidentally remote pre-heating on their own. On July 30, Van Horn posted the following message on Facebook to outline two forthcoming adjustments, writing:

All – I want you to know that we take accidental preheating seriously. We care about all of our owners and want you to be happy about your experience with June. The June team is actively working on a safeguard which includes two phases to prevent unintentional preheating from occurring. Phase one, which will be launched in a September software release, will include:

  • Owners will be able to disable remote preheat within their oven settings (below is a mockup of what this will look like)
  • The remote preheat option will default to On, but at any time you can choose to turn this off through Settings on your June
  • If you have turned remote preheat to Off and are cooking a recipe within the June Cookbook, you will get a notification that you need to change the setting on your oven to turn remote preheat back On to cook the recipe (this will allow the app to set the oven to the right cook mode and temperature for the recipe).

Phase two will include the ability for the June to recognize that there isn’t food inside the oven using our door and internal camera sensors when the oven is on. June will turn off the heating elements after a set amount of time if food isn’t detected inside the oven. This will be released early next year.

Van Horn told me that these features had been on the product roadmap for a while, but got prioritized because of the aforementioned user issues.

There are a lot of things wrong with social media, but situations like this show that it can be a powerful customer service and corporate communications tool. And speaking as a June owner, this fix will certainly ease my OCD.

Market Map: Booze Tech in 2019

From countertop devices used in the home kitchen to delivery services, the number of avenues in which companies can get booze to customers has expanded in recent years. And since it’s still the time of year when drinking on patios is a popular sport, we decided to focus our latest market map on all the tech out there currently changing the alcohol space.

In the U.S., alcohol consumption has actually stagnated, according to IWSR, but part of this is due to consumers now seeking quality over quantity when it comes to their drinking. Which might explain the rise in the number of companies offering recommendations apps that rate beers, wines, and spirits as well as at-home devices for the kitchen countertop that give the user a little more control over the quality of their drinks.

For The Spoon’s Booze Tech in 2019 market map, we divvied the market up into several categories where technology is making the biggest impact on the way people get, create, and consume beer, wine, and spirits. That’s everything from apps that update you on the best craft beers available to at-home bartending devices that let you release your inner mixologist to the many ways in which companies are making it possible to get the booze delivered right to your doorstep. We’ve narrowed the companies down to a collection of startups and major corporations alike. As with any post that outlines a market, this list isn’t exhaustive. So if you have thoughts and tips for who else you’d like to see here, feel free to drop us a line.

While we’re on the subject of maps, be sure to check out our 2019 Food Robotics market map and our Food Waste Innovation in 2019 map.

Booze Tech in 2019

What Sweden’s Quirky Food Tech Scene Could Mean for the Rest of the World

From parental leave policies to sustainability initiatives, Sweden is typically considered one of the most forward-thinking nations on earth.So it’s no surprise the country consistently pops up in food tech conversations, often for unusual projects that seem quirky at first glance but can actually tell us a lot about how tech is changing the way we eat.

Like making customers do what’s essentially a blind taste-test to see if they can tell the difference between a plant-based burger and the real deal. The famed Impossible Burger isn’t available in Europe right now, but that didn’t stop Burger King from using Vivera’s plant-based patty to create a version of its Whopper — and betting customers can’t discern the difference between it and a regular meat-based one.

To drive that point home, BK in Sweden launched the “50/50 menu” at the beginning of July where customers order BK’s signature burger and have a 50/50 chance of getting a meat version or the plant-based version. The only way to tell which is which is to scan a QR code on the wrapper.

It’s a gimmick, to be sure, but as my colleague Catherine Lamb pointed out, it’s also a way to get better data on plant-based offerings: “It will get a record of every consumer’s reaction to the sandwiches, and be able to quantify how often people are actually duped by the vegetarian alternatives.”

More data like this could give Burger King a realistic picture of how much customers actually want plant-based fast food — a useful lesson for businesses in any part of the world.

Or you could just hand your customers a picnic blanket. That’s what McDonald’s in Sweden did earlier this summer to promote its initiatives around delivering to public spaces via geofencing technologies. Customers scan a QR code on the picnic blanket to shoot their geographic information to a third-party delivery service, who will deliver a McDonald’s meal from the chain’s nearest location.

The idea isn’t specific to Sweden: companies like Domino’s and 7-Eleven also deliver to public locations rather than a numbered addresses. But there’s something more attention-grabbing about scanning a picnic blanket than simply logging into an app. PR stunt though it may be, it suggests a whole new avenue of possibilities when it comes to using everyday objects and settings in life to ramp up the food delivery business.

On a more ambitious level, come September 3, restaurant-goers in Stockholm will be able to experience what science, technology, academic research, design, and cooking look like when bundled together to form a single sustainable restaurant.

Restauranglabbet (“the restaurant lab”) will test numerous sustainability measures under one roof, from curbing food waste to cooking with more local, sustainable ingredients to measuring carbon footprint and using only eco-friendly materials in furniture design and production.

We won’t know how successful the project is until Restauranglabbet’s doors open on September 3, but no doubt there will be pieces of restaurant innovation coming out of the lab the whole world should take note of.

Elsewhere, a company in Stockholm called Diaz & Swahn is experimenting inside and outside the restaurant with how sound can affect the way food tastes to people. And a company called Local Food Node makes a digital platform that allows users to connect with local food producers by creating nodes that function as delivery and pickup spots for the food.

Will we be seeing QR-enabled picnic loot and sound-centric restaurants in the States anytime soon? Probably in part, particularly when it comes to building a more sustainable restaurant and finding new avenues for food delivery. In any case, keep your eye on Sweden one to watch for finding more innovative, scalable ways to integrate tech meaningfully into our food lives.

Tovala’s Scan-to-Cook Now Works with Breakfast Items From Pop-Tart, Eggo, Kashi and More

Tovala, creator of the eponymous smart oven, announced today that it has expanded the capabilities of its scan-to-cook feature to include packaged breakfast items from brands including Amy’s Kitchen, Eggo, Special K and more.

The update is being automatically sent out by Tovala and works with both gen-1 and gen-2 ovens. Tovala owners can go to https://www.tovala.com/scantocookgroceries to see the full list of nearly 400 compatible products. To cook, users simply scan the barcode of the item and the Tovala will run through a pre-programmed cooking sequence developed by the company’s chefs.

The move builds on earlier efforts by Tovala to broaden the usefulness of its device. Initially, the Tovala oven was primarily good for cooking Tovala meals, but the company has improved the flexibility of its product over the past year by releasing its second-gen oven, launching its scan-to-cook feature for Trader Joe’s frozen food, and releasing automatic cook programs for Beyond Meat products.

All of these moves help make the Tovala more versatile in the smart oven space, which is packed with the likes of June, Brava, Whirlpool and Suvie. By expanding beyond its vertically integrated beginnings, it can attract customers who want a smart oven, and want the flexibility to use it for more than Tovala meals.

Tovala has always been the least expensive smart oven option, and in addition to the breakfast products, Tovala also this week changed up its pricing structure. You can now pick up a Tovala for $49 up-front and pay the remainder in $3.99/week installments, with the option to return the oven at any time. Or you can pay $299 upfront to own the oven outright.

Of equal interest for Tovala with its scan-to-cook feature is the data that it can provide CPG companies. Tovala will know what brands and products people are cooking, when and how often. This data would provide insight for brands looking to develop new products or sell more in different regions. I spoke with Tovala Founder and CEO David Rabie yesterday about the prospect of prospecting its newfound data, but he said Tovala is not looking at sharing or monetizing it right now. “The goal is for us to make the Tovala more useful,” Rabie said, “and to make our partner’s products easier to consume in the way they intend.”

As Tovala continues to expand its scan-to-cook functionality, I asked Rabie whether at some point the company would give up on its own meal delivery service in favor of just automating the cooking of other people’s products. “We’re not going to get rid of meal delivery,” Rabie said, “It’s the core reason people are buying the oven.”

That may have been true when cooking its own meals was mostly what a Tovala oven did. But now there are nearly 400 more (scan-to-cook) reasons for people to check the Tovala out.

Exclusive: The Spoon Talks With ChefSteps CEO Young About Breville Acquisition

Big news today in the world of the connected kitchen. As Chris Albrecht previously reported, Breville has acquired ChefSteps, maker of the Joule sous vide appliance.

I caught up with ChefSteps CEO Chris Young to ask him about the deal. Below is a transcript of our conversation.

Congratulations on the news. Can you tell us a little about how this came together? 

Young: When the bad news broke, Breville quickly reached out. They had been longtime admirers of what we have done. As we met with Breville team in Sydney, as I got to know their CEO Jim Clayton and talked about what we were doing with software, community and content, and we talked about what we accomplished with Joule, they saw a real opportunity to accelerate what Breville was trying to do by putting us together.

How do they plan to integrate the company?

They are keeping the Seattle offices. They are going to be investing more in our software team and capabilities. I can’t talk about future roadmap plans, but I think there will be a lot of opportunity with what we’ve done with Joule and how it might work together with Breville products in the future, and I think you are going to see a lot of investment in content and community from the Chefsteps side. In a lot of ways, this is a great outcome. Everything we want to keep doing is going to continue to happen and our community has a great steward in Breville so there’s continuity of our business and work.

Are you are going to stay on?

Young: Right now [I’m] involved in Breville, having conversations about how my role will evolve. We’re working it out. Grant [Crilly] is staying on, most of the team is staying on, and I expect be involved in Breville in some way going forward.

Can you tell us the acquisition price?

Young: No. Those terms are confidential. But I will say everyone who is involved, though it’s been a very challenging few months, feels very good about the outcome.

Why Breville?

Young: I’ve known Breville for a very long time. I had worked with them back when I was with the Fat Duck.

April was a very tough time. Had to let go a lot of my colleagues, stabilize the business, take time to figure things out. But when I made list of who I think was the right company to go forward with, Breville was at the top of my list. So when they reached out, I was really happy. It made it really easy. We have a shared DNA, how we think about products, how we think about innovation, that we’re fundamentally there to serve our community of cooks. We’re never just about doing a product at a particular price point and a set of features, that’s never how we approached things. I also think it’s real validation [that] what we built, what we shipped, was really one of a kind.

You had been working on a number of other products. Can you tell us what will happen to the ChefSteps product roadmap under Breville?

Young: This is one of the changes for me. Breville has to make a lot of decisions. We’ll absolutely see Joule go forward. There is a lot of eagerness to see our roadmap go forward. Will everything go forward? I have no idea, but I know there are several things we are very close I think we will be able to ship to our community later this year and I am quite excited about that.

You’ll be paired with precision cooking pioneer Polyscience under Breville. Thoughts about that?  

Young: We worked with Polyscience early on. They were a pioneer in the commercial space. With Joule, Breville was not only wanting to have a commercial offering, but also wanted to have the best offering in the consumer space with Joule.

The consumer sous vide market has been really competitive and some companies have struggled. Any thoughts on how it looks going forward?

The sous vide market is growing tremendously. The market is growing very fast, over 40% per year. Prime Day was fantastic for us. [I] think there has been a challenge in the industry. Some of it is a timing question. Some of the obvious strategic buyers that would give startups an exit, they’re maybe not ready yet to transform themselves with technology and they’re struggling out to figure out how they would benefit.

That is sort of the problem: there are not a lot of buyers that yet have the vision they need for the technologies that companies like ChefSteps pioneered. Breville gets it. They were already committing to a connected future and we just provided a great opportunity to accelerate it. I think until you get more companies recognizing they absolutely need this technology as part of their future, you’re going to see these companies struggle. But fundamentally, I think we’ve proven this technology is absolutely worthwhile and the relationships with their customers are invaluable.

Is the Joule Ready sauce business dead?

Young: I don’t think any final decisions have been made. We’re not putting back into production immediately. These are assets that Breville has acquired. There was a lot of things we were developing behind the scenes our customers absolutely loved. To be candid, I wish that business had a little bit more time to mature because their growth numbers were tremendous. I don’t know if I would say its dead, it might just be a question of priorities before anyone can turn back to it.