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The Spoon

Daily news and analysis about the food tech revolution

boba

Yo-Kai to Debut Boba Making Robot at CES 2024

In less than two weeks, Yo-Kai Express, a company that’s become synonymous with hot ramen-making robots, will show it has a sweet side with the debut of a boba-making robot at CES in Las Vegas.

Yo-Kai CEO Andy Lin told The Spoon that the company’s new robotic boba maker will be the first boba-bot that incorporates a cooking pot inside the appliance, enabling it to cook boba tapioca pearls as well as other toppings. According to Lin, the machine’s built-in cooking capability will allow it to be more than just a boba-maker, enabling it to create a variety of different hot and cold beverages and meals ranging from instant oatmeal to protein shakes to soups and coffees.

The first machine will be shipped to Netflix’s headquarters in Los Gatos, California. After that, Lin says that distribution will be a phased release with around ten boba-bots shipped to other corporate headquarters in the Bay Area. Another shipment in March will put the Yo-Kai boba machine at college campuses and other locations, and starting in June, the Yo-Kai boba-bot will be widely available to individual operators who want to operate a Yo-Kai.

And it’s with this wider availability that Yo-Kai will begin a new expansion approach that will extend beyond its current operating model. Lin says that in 2024, the company plans to phase its expansion model into one utilizing a partner model where individual operators will pay an initial startup fee to Yo-Kai, and from there, they will be able to take ownership of the boba and begin operating it. Lin says that the model, which is “franchise-like”, will offer new operators a choice of up to 1,500 different locations that Yo-Kai has helped find through a new strategic partnership with a large real estate management company.

“Usually, if a partner wants to open a boba store, they need to find a location by themselves,” said Lin. “But we don’t need them to find a location; we can actually provide a location to them. So it will be a one-stop-shop: Go to the website, select the region you want to have the machine, and we will work together with them.”

While the Yo-Kai boba-bot certainly isn’t the first automated boba-making machine, no other company has had much success in expanding beyond initial pilots and trials. Bobacino, which debuted in 2020, saw its CEO depart last month, and it’s not clear if the company is still operational. Cloutea, which debuted its boba robot at CES 2023, opened a store in Las Vegas this past April but has not expanded beyond a single location.

The new Yo-Kai boba robot will debut at CES, which starts on January 9th and runs through January 12th. The new boba bot will be featured in the food tech area on the show floor in the Venetian Expo Hall at CES.

Stay tuned to The Spoon for more food tech coverage at CES over the next two weeks.

Soon You Will Be Able to Buy Bubble Tea From a Robot and Pay With Your Face

If having a boba drink made by a robot wasn’t futuristic enough for you, soon you will be able to pay for that bubble tea with your face.

That’s because Bobacino, the maker of eponymous boba-making robots, announced today it has partnered up with PopID to let boba lovers pay for their drinks using facial recognition technology.

The way it works is customers can choose to opt-in and register using the PopID app. The app will scan the user’s face during registration, and from there, they can preorder and pay for the boba tea on the app. The customer can also choose to verify their ID once at the Bobacino kiosk to retrieve the drink. Once scanned, the drink is dispensed.

The PopID app integrated with Bobacino

If this all sounds like technology piled on technology, it is. That said, there’s no doubt biometrics as a form of payment has its advantages. Face-pay and other biometrics do add additional security beyond that of the traditional debit card PIN or even NFC-powered mobile payment, since, after all, it’s tough to fake someone’s face (or retina).

The big challenge for face-pay systems will be convincing some customers to use them. The rollout of face-pay in China raised privacy concerns and left some customers confused by the onboarding process. Because PopID’s system is opt-in, it may sidestep privacy concerns, but the two companies will still have work to do educating customers on the benefits of face-pay.

PopID’s move into automated beverage kiosks is a logical evolution given the company’s early traction integrating with payment kiosks as restaurants looked for ways to mitigate consumer fear about COVID. Last year, the company established its pay-by-face network in Southern California and had since taken it nationwide, riding the wave of interest over in contactless payment.

For Bobacino, partnering with PopID adds one more interesting tool in the toolbox for its operator partners when the company rolls out the machines. Last year, the company said it planned to roll out its machines in the second half of 2021, and they are currently raising funds on StartEngine to help fund the rollout. Bobacino is backed by Wavemaker Ventures, the same fund backing Miso, Piestro (who also partnered with PopID), and other food robotics startups.

You can see what the Bobacino looks like in action (face-pay not included) on the video below:

Bobacino Brand FINAL3