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The Spoon

Daily news and analysis about the food tech revolution

Miso Robotics

Miso Robotics Partners with PathSpot for More Automated Hygiene in Restaurants

If it’s one thing we’ve all learned during this pandemic, it’s the importance of hand washing. And one group of people in particular you want washing their hands frequently are restaurant workers.

To help restaurants ensure that the people handling your food are properly handling their hygiene, Miso Robotics announced a partnership with PathSpot today in a move the companies say will “advance sterile and healthy cooking environments.”

Miso Robotics is the company behind Flippy, the burger-flipping, fry cooking robot, while PathSpot makes a device that lets restaurants scan employees’ hands to ensure proper washing (i.e. no poop hands). The two might not seem like the most obvious bedfellows at first, but both companies are the in the business of automating kitchen processes.

At first, the Miso/PathSpot relationship will be around cross-selling. So any discussion Miso has with a potential QSR client could include the addition of a PathSpot device. But Dr. Ryan Sinnet, CTO of Miso Robotics told me by phone this week that the agreement is multi-stage and as it progresses there will be opportunities for dataflow and other technological integrations between the two systems.

Today’s announcement follows a partnership Miso announced in March of this year with PopID to install thermal imaging cameras at a Caliburger location (all three companies count Cali Group as an investor). These thermal cameras will take the temperature of customers, employees and delivery people entering the restaurant to detect if anyone has a fever. In addition to these fever scanning capablities, the PopID kiosks can be used for contactless payment which relies only on facial recognition.

While all of these technologies have been around for a couple of years, they could find accelerated interest in a post-COVID-19 world. As restaurants start to re-open in some parts of the country, they are doing so with new regulations meant to help prevent any potential resurgence of the virus. Scanning employees for fevers and their hands for cleanliness, using a robot to cook food and having customers pay with their face may have seemed downright dystopian just a few months ago. But in a post-pandemic world, they may be the new normal to try and protect wary customers and tentative businesses.

Miso Robotics Officially Opens Equity Crowdfunding Campaign to Raise $30M

Miso Robotics, the company behind Flippy, the burger grilling, tater tot frying robot, announced today that it is kicking off its equity crowdfunding campaign to raise a $30 million Series C round.

Equity crowdfunding eschews traditional institutional funding such as venture capital and allows everyday people to invest directly in a company. In the case of Miso, a minimum investment of $1,493 per investor is required in order to participate. (And we should interject that any investment is a risk and this post is not an endorsement of Miso.)

Miso announced the equity crowdfunding campaign back in November, but it still required SEC approval before it could officially begin. According to the press announcement emailed to us, Miso says it has already secured $2.6 million in reservations with a pre-money valuation of $80 million.

Earlier this year, Miso introduced its newest generation of Flippy, the ROAR, which has the robot suspended on rails above a cooking space to make more room for any human co-workers.

This jump into equity crowdfunding comes at an interesting time, to say the least. The world is in the throes of a global pandemic that is costing millions of jobs, has sent the stock market reeling and is creating even new levels of uncertainty. How many everyday people impacted by COVID-19 are going to have the money to plunk down at minimum of $1,500 to own a small part of a robot company?

Not to mention the fact that a big driver of food automation in restaurants was a labor crunch. With an estimated 3 percent of US restaurants permanently closed, there will be a lot of human workers suddenly available once this pandemic passes.

On the other hand, the coronavirus outbreak and fear of human-to-human transmission of the virus is sparking all kinds of change throughout the food system. In a post-corona world, robots that prepare food could be seen as a way to make restaurants more hygienic. This, in turn, could spark a boom in food robotics.

Equity crowdfunding has become a bit of a trend in the food tech world. Other companies like Winc, Small Robot Company, GOffee and GoSun have all turned to the everyday investor for their latest rounds of funding. On one level, it provides them with the flexibility to grow as they like without added pressure from scale-seeking VCs, but it also denies companies the networks and knowledge VCs can provide.

Miso has made its choice, and now we’ll see if everyday investors flip for Flippy the robot.

Flippy Flips Upside Down for QSRs, Will It Impact Miso’s Crowdfunding?

Miso Robotics is taking its cooking robot, Flippy, and uhh, flipping it upside down in a bid to bring in more QSR business. Today the company revealed a prototype of its next version of cooking technology dubbed Miso Robot on a Rail (ROAR).

Rather than being fixed to the ground, the new ROAR is installed on a rail above the cooking surface. It still uses a robotic arm to flip burgers and remove fry baskets, but it now glides back and forth overhead.

According to the press announcement, the new ROAR was developed using market feedback from QSRs that wanted more of a zero footprint solution that doesn’t get in the way of busy human cooks. The current iteration of Flippy is stationary, and surrounding the arm itself, there is a safety zone taped around it to keep human limbs way from automated movements. So it can take up quite a bit of space.

The Flippy brain has also been augmented with new cooking capabilities. In addition to grilling burgers, Miso’s robot can fry up chicken wings, onion rings, popcorn shrimp, sweet potato waffle fries, corn dogs and more.

The ROAR won’t be available commercially until the end of this year. In the meantime, Miso also announced that it is introducing an intermediate model that uses a floor-mounted rail system. Nation’s Restaurant News reports that the new ROAR will cost roughly $30,000. This is about half what the first Flippy’s cost, which was ultimately too high a price for a lot of QSRs.

The news of ROAR also comes as Miso Robotics is equity crowdfunding its next fundraise. While Miso has raised $13 million from traditional VCs in the past, the company is now using the SeedInvest platform to try and raise $30 million. Will the new Flippy sway a few more everyday investors?

The Flippy ROAR also comes in a time of flux for articulating robotic arms. Cafe X closed three of its locations, and Zume shut down its robot-assisted pizza delivery service. Other startups, however, are, like Miso, all-in on robotic limbs. Macco Robotics and Robojuice both believe that a more humanoid-like form factor will connect better with customers.

While Flippy is on display at Caliburger in Pasadena, the new ROAR seems more geared towards production and throughput. With a lower price, we’ll have to see if QSRs put in their order for one.

Two Trends to Watch Out for in 2020: Pop-Ups and Equity Crowdfunding

Based on the volume of digital ink I devoted in 2019 to cashierless checkout and robot-related startups, you’d think that I would pick those sectors as trends to watch in 2020.

While I think those segments will continue to grow steadily over the coming months, the two trends I’m most fascinated by are the ones I actually wrote very little about this year. If you’re looking for a couple of big, juicy trends I think you should pay attention to, you should explore semi-permanent pop-ups and equity crowdfunding.

Pop-up stores have been around for a while, but there are a number of startups looking to capitalize on their small footprint and easy setup to create new retail experiences. AiFi creates nano-stores are small, self-contained shipping container-like boxes that house an operation like a convenience store. These stores are cashierless (like Amazon Go), so customers can walk in, grab what they want and go.

Zippin is another company building out cashierless retail experiences, though it’s “Zippin Cube” is more customizable. The Zippin Cube is modular, so it can fit into existing, odd-shaped real estate. The Cubes can also hold coolers and come pre-wired, so they can be assembled and up and running in as little as three weeks.

Both Zippin and AiFi allow retail brands to quickly, easily and inexpensively set up pop-up stores in sporting venues, office lobbies or even music festivals. Retailers can then extend their brand into new venues without expensive and permanent build out. Think: a mini-Safeway at the base of your office building or a 7-11 at Coachella.

The ability to cheaply squirrel these stores into the nooks and crannies of high-volume but unused space will entice retailers to try them out next year.

Speaking of enticing, I expect startups will sing their siren song next year to entice everyday people to pony up through equity fundraising. Unlike the traditional product crowdfunding on Kickstarter, equity crowdfunding offers investors real equity in the companies they back.

GoSun, GOffee (unrelated “Gos” there) and Miso Robotics all launched equity crowdfunding campaigns this year. GoSun has raised $345,000 with 25 days left in its campaign. GOffee raised $1.07 million, and Miso Robotics aims to equity crowdfund a whopping $30 million.

This is actually GoSun’s second round of equity crowdfunding. The company raised $500,000 in seed money from the crowd in 2017. I spoke with GoSun CEO Patrick Sherwin earlier this year about the reason for crowdfunding and he told me:

“Traditional VC will breathe down your neck,” Sherwin said, “And drive everything towards more profit. This gives us more flexibility and keeps us in charge.”

Greater control over their own destiny is an attractive proposition for startups, and equity crowdfunding also has the benefit of giving companies that aren’t located in major VC hubs access to capital.

There are still plenty of SEC hurdles that a company must go through when equity crowdfunding, but I imagine we’ll see a lot more companies go that route to grow the way they want to.

Miso Robotics Aims to Equity Crowdfund $30 Million

Miso Robotics, creator of Flippy the burger grilling robot, announced today that it is looking to raise a $30 million through equity crowdfunding for its next round of financing. The company’s last round was a $10 million Series B back in February of 2018, and Miso has raised nearly $15 million in total to date.

By going the crowdfunding route, individuals can invest in and receive actual equity in Miso Robotics. As with any investment, there is risk involved and no guarantee of financial return. Miso is using SeedInvest’s (by Circle) equity crowdfunding platform, along Wavemaker Labs, to execute the fundraise.

Miso is most famous for its Flippy robot, an articulating arm that can grill burgers as well as fry french fries, tater tots and chicken tenders. Flippy’s first gig was with fast casual chain CaliBurger, and additional robots have since gone on to work at LA Dodgers Stadium and Arizona Diamondbacks Chase Field.

On the crowdfunding page, the company says that it has a pre-money valuation of $80 million and that individuals looking to buy in must make a $1,500 minimum investment. Also, in a move that seems somewhat comedic, given the money involved, the company lists perks available for different investment tiers. A $3,000 investment gets you a Miso Robotics hat and a voucher for 5 free CaliBurgers. Invest $250,000 or more and you get “10 Miso Robotics hats and voucher for 100 free CaliBurgers, 1 PopID facial recognition scanner installed at your home or place of business, Trip to Los Angeles for 4 people to a regular season LA Dodgers game.” Why someone would want a facial recognition scanner meant for restaurant loyalty programs in their house, I’m not sure.

The fact that Miso is crowdfunding its next round is made all the more intriguing since we learned last month that Miso Robotics Co-Founder and CEO, Dave Zito, as well as COO, Melissa Hampton Burghardt, were no longer with the company. Reasons for their departure were not given. However Zito sent us a statement at that time saying he was still the company’s largest shareholder.

Equity crowdfunding seems to be more of a thing nowadays, with companies like GOffee and GoSun both running such campaigns. But we are curious as to why a company with Miso Robotics’ pedigree would go down the equity crowdfunding path, given the complexity of its technology and earlier fundraising achievements.

With the campaign officially launched, we’ll see if everyday investors will flip over Flippy.

The Co-Founder and CEO of Miso Robotics, Maker of Flippy, Is No Longer With the Company

Dave Zito, who was Co-Founder and CEO of Miso Robotics, is no longer with the company, The Spoon has learned. This is the second high-profile C-level loss for Miso, following COO Melissa Hampton Burghardt’s departure from the company in September.

Miso Robotics is the startup behind Flippy, the burger flipping, fry cooking robot. Flippy is probably best known for being implemented at CaliBurger in Pasadena, CA (both Miso Robotics and Flippy are companies in the Cali Group holding company). Flippy was also employed by Dodger Stadium to fry chicken tenders and tater tots, and Walmart was experimenting with the robot as well.

At this point, we aren’t sure what spurred Zito’s departure. Zito confirmed with us that he is no longer with Miso and provided the following statement that has been slightly edited for length and clarity:

Yes I can confirm I’ve moved on from Miso. As a co-founder and one of the largest shareholders I am still rooting for the team and the vision we set forth. I’m so proud of all we accomplished together.

I’m a firm believer that breakthroughs in Machine Learning, Computer Vision, and Real-time Controls for Automation present the next great wave in disruptive technologies that I believe will radically aid humanity in addressing the most pressing problems of our age. I remain resolutely focused in aiding and supporting this burgeoning ecosystem that is leveraging these technologies to produce teams and products built to make a truly positive and lasting impact.

A spokesperson for Miso also confirmed the news saying the two parties split “amicably” and that Buck Jordan, Founding Partner of Miso will be interim CEO, and helping with the search for a full-time replacement.

The news of Zito’s departure comes a week after CaliBurger announced its 2.0 initiative, which involved adding a second Flippy robot station. Miso Robotics has raised $13.1 million in funding.

CaliBurger Adds a Second Flippy Robot to Make French Fries

Fast food chain CaliBurger announced its new “CaliBurger 2.0” restaurant yesterday, which includes new high-tech features like pay-with-your-face kiosks and the addition of a second Flippy cooking robot.

CaliBurger made headlines last year when it first used Flippy to autonomously grill up burgers at its Pasadena, CA location. The burger chain made even more headlines when it took Flippy offline after just one day on the job because it was too fast for its human co-workers. After some re-tooling Flippy went back on the line a couple months later and has been cooking ever since.

CaliBurger and Miso Robotics, which makes Flippy, are both companies in the CaliGroup portfolio.

While Flippy started its robotic life using computer vision and thermal imaging to make burgers, it has also been taught to work the deep fryer. Since last summer Flippy has been frying up chicken tenders and tater tots at Dodger Stadium, and the robot will bring those skills to make french fries at the new CaliBurger 2.0 locations.

As noted, CaliBurger 2.0 locations will also feature the pay-by-face kiosks. This automated payment system records your face (with your permission), and can keep an order history to immediately surface favorites on the touchscreen interface. We used it last year and it worked just fine.

While robots and interactive kiosks were pretty novel last year, they are quickly becoming more commonplace in fast food restaurants. Just this week, Picnic unveiled its pizza making robot, and Creator‘s burger robot is still hard at work. The global kiosk market is expected to hit $30.8 billion thanks to implementations at QSRs like Dunkin, Shake Shack and Wendy’s.

CaliBurger 2.0 will open its first location this month in Fort Meyers, FL, followed by stores in Seattle, WA, Tysons, VA and Pasadena.

Welp. Robots Have Knives Now, and Know How to Use Them (to Slice Onions)

Well, fellow humans, we had a good run, but our time is over. Robots have their knives out — literally — and know how to use them.

Terminator-esque teasing aside, IEEE Spectrum has a video roundup of some of cutting-edge (sorry) robotics research being done right now. Included among the videos is “Robotic Cutting: Mechanics and Control of Knife Motion,” by Xiaoqian Mu, Yuechuan Xue, and Yan-Bin Jia from Iowa State University, in Ames, Iowa, USA.

You may think that having a robot to slice an onion mainly entails a big mechanical arm slamming a knife down, but you’d be wrong. The researchers created a program that combines and coordinates pressing, pushing and slicing motions. From the research paper’s Introduction:

Cutting skills such as chop, slice, and dice are mostly beyond the reach of today’s robots. Technical challenges come not just from manipulation of soft and irregularly-shaped objects, but more from doing so while fracture is happening. The latter requires planning and force control based on reliable modeling of an object’s deformation and fracture as it is being cut. The knife’s movement needs to be adjusted to progress in terms of material fracture. Its trajectory may need to be replanned in the case of an unforeseeable situation (e.g., appearance of a bone).

Robotic Cutting: Mechanics and Control of Knife Motion

As you can see from the video, this particular robot won’t be wowing crowds at a Benihana anytime soon, but it shows once again that robots are getting more proficient at higher-skilled tasks. Automation is coming for food sector jobs, and while we think of them right now in terms of flipping burgers and bussing tables, robots will be automating more and more tasks in restaurants, like prepping vegetables.

Dishcraft, for example, is still pretty tight lipped around what it’s working on, but the company has talked about building robots to do specific tasks in restaurant kitchens like prep work. Miso Robotics’ Flippy was created in part to take over dangerous tasks like working the grill and deep fryer in the kitchen, and the company has already talked about Flippy eventually chopping vegetables.

While there are still many issues to work through with the rise of robots, having them handle knives in the kitchen (and saving countless fingertips from lacerations) is probably not such a bad thing.

Here’s The Spoon’s 2019 Food Robotics Market Map

Today we head to San Francisco for The Spoon’s first-ever food-robotics event. ArticulAte kicks off at 9:05 a.m. sharp at the General Assembly venue in SF, and throughout the daylong event talk will be about all things robots, from the technology itself to business and regulatory issues surrounding it.

When you stop and look around the food industry, whether it’s new restaurants embracing automation or companies changing the way we get our groceries, it’s easy to see why the food robotics market is projected to be a $3.1 billion market by 2025.

But there’s no one way to make a robot, and so to give you a sense of who’s who in this space, and to celebrate the start of ArticulAte, The Spoon’s editors put together this market map of the food robotics landscape.

This is the first edition of this map, which we’ll improve and build upon as the market changes and grows. If you have any suggestions for other companies or see ones we missed you think should be in there, let us know by leaving a comment below or emailing us at tips@thespoon.tech.

Click on the map below to enlarge it.

The Food Robotics Market 2019:

ArticulATE Q&A: Miso’s CEO on How Flippy the Robot Will Move From Frying to Chopping

Ahh Flippy. It was the first food robot I ever wrote about, way back in…2018. Back then, it could only grill burgers. Now, a year later, it can fry tater tots and chicken tenders, and will reportedly soon get a job in a deli.

They grow up so fast. Soon Flippy will want the keys to not drive the autonomous car.

We’re going to get a full report on what Flippy is — and will be — up to when Dave Zito, CEO of Miso Robotics, sits down for an on-stage chat at our upcoming ArticulATE conference on April 16 in San Francisco. We were so excited to have him be a part of the show that we couldn’t wait and sent him some questions via email, which he was kind enough to answer.

This is but an autonomous amuse bouche — get your ticket today to see Zito and a host of truly amazing speakers at ArticulATE!

THE SPOON: Flippy started off grilling burgers and then moved on to frying up chicken tenders. What particular jobs in the kitchen are Flippy, and robots in general, really good at?

ZITO: We started Miso Robotics with the idea of giving eyes and a brain to a robotic arm so it could work in commercial kitchens with real-time situational awareness and real-time robotic controls. We designed and starting building the system from Day One as a software platform that could automate the cooking of all manner of foods and recipes, with all equipment and restaurant brands, and all kitchen formats.

Our autonomous robotic Kitchen Assistants are focused on helping with the most repetitive, dangerous, and least desirable tasks in the kitchen. Flippy grilling burgers was our proof of concept. Flippy can now fry many different kinds of foods as well. These tasks can be improved and optimized for consistency, ensuring each meal is cooked to the perfect temperature with minimal food waste. Beyond frying, grilling, and other cooking, expect them over time to help with tasks like chopping onions, cutting other vegetables, and even cleaning.

The Kitchen Assistant improves and learns over time based on the data available. Ultimately, this frees up kitchen staff to spend more time with customers. We believe the future of food is on-demand, accessible, personalized, and scalable. We are building the technology platform leveraging automation, machine learning, and robotics advancements to deliver on this future.

What did you learn from Flippy’s time at Dodger Stadium?

Flippy’s deployment at Dodger Stadium emphasized how much one kitchen assistant can impact productivity and efficiency in a high-volume commercial kitchen. Dodger Stadium was the first time we deployed our frying capabilities, and we matched max productivity while producing consistently fried foods to the chef’s expectations. Cooking for extended periods of peak demand during baseball games was a key proof point for the reliability and sustained high throughput of our Kitchen Assistants.

But don’t just take our word for it; here is what our partner Levy had to say about the experience:

“The robotic kitchen assistant helps us more quickly and safely cook perfectly crispy chicken tenders and tater tots,” said Robin Rosenberg, Vice President and Chef de Cuisine for Levy. “It’s amazing to see the kitchen assistant and team members working together, and the consistency of product is incredible.”

“New technologies at large scale venues and events like this need to add value for both guests and team members,” said Jaime Faulkner, CEO of E15, Levy’s analytics subsidiary. “Working with Miso, we were able to create a process that both delivers high quality food more quickly, and gives kitchen team members a chance to hone sought-after skills working with robotics and automation.”

We are looking forward to resuming frying with Levy this baseball season.

What is the biggest misconception about food robots in the kitchens?

The biggest misconception about the use of technology in the kitchen is that it’s about job replacement. There is a growing labor crisis in the restaurant industry. Local workforces are shrinking, and wages are increasing, making commercial cooking uneconomical. Meanwhile, consumers have an increased desire for meals cooked for them, whether via delivery, take-out, dining out, or grocery deli meals, adding pressure on kitchen workers.

Restaurants already see 150% turnover today from a dissatisfied workforce. Pair this with an aging workforce that can’t handle some of the physical demands that come with the job and commercial kitchens are struggling to recruit and retain talent. Intelligent automation not only creates an avenue for meaningful work for the next generation through the creation of new jobs like a Chef Tech (employees trained to manage the robot), but also takes the physical burden off of more mature employees who want to continue to contribute later in life.

The tasks that Miso’s technology can perform are some of the most dangerous tasks in the kitchen, not to mention messy and menial, ultimately improving the employee experience by freeing up time for them to focus on more meaningful work, like warm customer service that a robot simply can’t match.

What should restaurant owners know about food robots before implementing them?

Expect improvements across several aspects of their business — better food, better customer service, better inventory and cost management. While a signature recipe for a restaurant can make it a success, it can be hard to reliably reproduce at scale to every customer, but robots like Flippy can deliver consistency in flavor to help keep customers loyal. Furthermore, the value proposition of implementing robotics in the kitchen spans productivity and cost-savings to one of the most pressing issues in our world today – sustainability. Food waste is a huge contributor to the climate crisis we are in, wasting $160 billion of food a year. This technology has the potential to significantly reduce that number – restaurants can contribute to a positive step in the right direction of food waste and ensure they are maximizing inventory as they begin to grow.

What is your favorite fictional robot?

As a kid I loved Johnny 5 from the film Short Circuit. I loved the idea that technology built for one purpose, in this case the military, once embedded with artificial intelligence shifted to more compassionate pursuits. In that way we are inspired at Miso to take industrial robotic arms, add our intelligence, and in so doing improve them for a broader and more impactful service — helping liberate commercial kitchens from repetitive tasks and mediocre menus, while empowering chefs to make delicious and nutritious meals accessible for all.

Video: We Check Out Creator, the Burger-Making Robot

When I was in San Francisco last week I had the good fortune to visit Creator, the restaurant that cooks their burgers via robot.

Creator‘s 14-foot robot creates custom burgers from scratch. It splits and toasts the bun, adds condiments and toppings (like ketchup, lettuce, and pickles), drops and melts freshly-shredded cheese, and grinds and cooks beef patties — all to order. The process takes roughly 5 minutes and can make approximately 120 patties per hour.

Unfortunately, Creator doesn’t have a vegetarian option (yet), so I didn’t get to taste anything made by the burger-bot. But I did get to see it in action! Check out the sped up video below to see the whole process from start to finish.

A Visit to Creator Burger in San Francisco

Are you a huge food robot nerd? (Same!) Join us on April 16th in San Francisco for Articulate, the food robotics and automation summit! Tickets are available here, but they’ll go fast — snag yours now.

Walmart Gives Flippy the Frying Robot a Shot

Flippy, the burger flipping, fry cooking robot, is auditioning for a new gig in Walmart’s deli department, according to Yahoo Finance. The retail giant has been testing Flippy out at its Culinary Institute and Innovation Center, where the robot fries up items like potato wedges, mozzarella sticks and chicken tenders.

This wouldn’t be the first time Miso Robotics‘ Flippy worked a fryer. The robot got a gig this past summer at Dodger Stadium, where it helped cook up more than ten thousand pounds of chicken tenders and tater tots, churning out up to 80 baskets per hour.

As we wrote earlier, there are three core technologies powering Flippy’s fry capabilities:

At the fryer, Flippy uses the Miso See, Miso Serve and Miso Move technologies to fry up the aforementioned tenders and tots. Miso See allows Flippy to identify food, cookware and utensils. Miso Serve helps the robot make real-time cooking decisions. Miso Move controls Flippy’s movements to make sure it is working safely and efficiently. All together, Flippy can put full baskets in the fry oil, monitor the cooking time (and gently shake the baskets while cooking), remove the baskets to drain the oil, and set the food at a designated location for serving.

It should come as no surprise that Walmart is mulling over adding Flippy to its cooking team. Walmart likes to use robots for manual, repetitive tasks and already has them scanning store shelves, cleaning floors and potentially even driving shopping carts.

But that’s three jobs at Walmart that will potentially be performed by robots and not humans. Miso Robotics CEO, David Zito told Yahoo Finance, “Our whole thing is not about job replacement, right….What we want to do is assist the hardworking linemen cooks and chefs in America with tools to give them the ability to faithfully reproduce while taking the burden off some of these more repetitive and mundane tasks.” For its part, Walmart says having robots handle these repetitive tasks frees up humans to prep other food and do more customer service.

While there are mountains of ethical issues coming down the pike as robots take more of our jobs, the fry cook is one where it might actually make sense. In addition to being manual and repetitive, there’s also a certain level of danger associated with standing over a vat of hot oil. Robots,however, don’t get burned, and because they use software to precisely repeat its tasks all day, they won’t burn your tenders.