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Daily news and analysis about the food tech revolution

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Video: To Succeed in the Smart Kitchen, “You Have to Get Multi-Modal Fast”

Voice is becoming more and more present in consumer electronics. At the same time, appliances are also coming with a whole host of AI-powered, software-driven interfaces and interactions.

How do these components work together in the kitchen? In this video from the 2018 Smart Kitchen Summit, Stacey Higginbotham of the IoT Podcast moderates a panel with Shelby Bonnie of Pylon AI, Adnan “Boat” Agboatwalla of Samsung and Jason Clarke of Crank Software about the evolution of smart appliances and interfaces in the heart of the home.

There’s a lot to consider. As Clarke said, “there’s all these interfaces that I want to jump between depending on the task and the environment of the moment.” For example, if his daughter is being loud, he doesn’t want to rely on voice to turn on his oven; if his hands are dirty, vice versa.

In short: the smart kitchen can’t function just with video screens or voice, but both working together. “You have to get to multi-modal fast,” said Bonnie.

But for the ultimate user experience these appliances all have to work together, too. “There should be a platform that connects everything… multi-branded appliances should be able to talk and work together,” said Agboatwalla. Easy? Maybe not. But with conversations like these, we can pave the way to a more connected kitchen and a better cooking experience.

Watch the full video below.

Beyond The Dial: Exploring Voice and AI-Powered Interfaces For The Kitchen

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.

Samsung Adds Food Image Recognition To Bixby Through Calorie Mama API

Search has come a long way since the earliest algorithms deployed by Google, Lycos, and Inktomi. After conquering basic and complex queries, search engines set their sites on images, video, and audio as frontiers that required new ways of looking at metadata to provide consumers with useful results.

Image recognition has been a focus of developers wanting to add value to the basic ability to capture and identify a picture of a peach or a fast food meal at Wendy’s. The key, as exemplified by companies such as Palo Alto-based Azumio, is to link image recognition to valuable datasets. For Azumio’s Calorie Mama AI-powered platform, the company offers an API available for third-party developers as well as a consumer download which allows users to track nutrition intake.

While Azumio faces competition from Google and Pinterest, a new partnership with Samsung may allow the folks behind Calorie Mama to separate itself from the pack. Samsung has announced a working relationship with Azumio to adds its Calorie Mama technology to Bixby, the South Korean giant’s AI personal assistant platform. Calorie Mama will be baked into the new Galaxy S9 and S9+ enabling users to obtain instant nutritional information about the food they eat.

“Our vision for the Calorie Mama API is to provide the best food image recognition technology to our partners,” Tom Xu, co-founder of Azumio said in a press release, “and to simplify nutrition tracking and food discovery for healthy living to their customers.”

While this announcement is a nice to have for Samsung smart device users, the true value goes far beyond the basic ability to count calories and set nutrition goals. Azumio’s work primarily is focused in areas related to health in such areas as diabetes and sleep disorders. The company’s Argus platform offers activity and diet tracking along with a social network focused on health and fitness. Argus powers its suite of applications such as Instant Heart Rate, Sleep Time, Fitness Buddy and Glucose Buddy.  The endgame of connecting food recognition with health-related applications, focusing on those in which diet management is essential, is where the real power lies.

Samsung and Azumio’s combined efforts began in 2013 when the Argus platform was offered in Samsung’s Gear line of devices. Samsung continues to work on its own proprietary health and fitness apps, but those have not been offered to consumers outside of Korea. The value of adding Calorie Mama to Bixby could show great promise. For example, a cook wanting to create a healthy meal could ask Bixby to recommend a substitute for a high-fat ingredient by tapping into its database of image data.

Pinterest—which is preparing for a possible IPO—will undoubtedly rise to the challenge to go beyond its image recognition work with Google (called Lens) which allows users to find recipe pins based on captured pictures. Pinterest recently has hired a new head of computer vision, Chuck Rosenberg, a 14-year Google veteran. Given the primary task of computer vision technology is to analyze images and tie those results to associated data, Pinterest is on an accelerated path in this space. Unlike Samsung, working in a somewhat closed ecosystem, Pinterest will make its application available to all takers.

The Battle For The Kitchen Screen Got A Lot More Interesting At CES 2018

When I wrote about the battle for the kitchen TV last June, the launch of the Echo Show was one of the signals that told me companies were beginning to pay attention to the space. Half a year later, my own usage of the Show has helped me better understand why.

That’s because ever since Amazon’s video-enabled Alexa assistant entered our home, it’s the first thing my eyes are drawn to as I enter the kitchen. The continuous scroll of news and weather, integration with popular apps like Pandora and Allrecipes, and access to videos all have quietly made the small screen indispensable for my entire family.

And now, with a slew of standalone smart displays and kitchen-centric video screens at CES last week, I’m more convinced than ever as we enter 2018 the kitchen TV market will be a fascinating one to watch.

Here are some of the kitchen screen entrants from this year’s big consumer show:

Echo Show And The Competitors

In some ways, the Echo Show and its small screen competitors are the early favorites. Whether or not to purchase a $200 or below (today the Show is on sale for $179) countertop video-enabled voice assistant is a much easier decision to make than that of a $3 thousand fridge. And now, with Google pouring money into the space, you can expect many more choices and over time.

CES 2018 featured some new smart displays on, um, display, many of them designed to be used with Google Assistant. I suspect at some point Google will likely come out with a first-party device (like the Echo Show), but for now we have displays from the likes of Lenovo, Philips and JBL and the initial reviews are pretty positive.

Fridge TV

Hard to believe, but Samsung’s already on version three of its Family Hub fridge, a product that is fast becoming the central focus of the CE giant’s broader smart home strategy. I stopped by the Samsung CES showroom at the Aria to check out the Family Hub 3, and I have to say the new screen looks good.

And as is often the case, LG has followed Samsung’s lead with the ThinQ Instaview Fridge but took things one step further by making their smart screen translucent so you can also see what’s in your fridge. You can see a demo of the LG ThinQ Instaview Fridge here:

While the idea of fridge TVs continue to gain steam, some argue that there’s a mismatch between the life cycle of cutting-edge tech and that of installed appliances. An appliance is an investment, something most consumers expect to last up to a decade. Technology, on the other hand, can be outdated after a few years. This argument resonated after talking to someone at the Samsung booth, who told me the Family Hub gen-1 likely wouldn’t be updated to the third generation software that is coming out with the Family Hub 3, (though the Family Hub Ones in the field were recently updated to Family Hub 2 software).

Despite this, I think the centrality of the fridge in most kitchens and the early relative success of the Family Hub will fuel interest in making the fridge the star of the kitchen TV market.

The GE Kitchen Hub 

One of the more interesting concepts in kitchen TV I saw at CES was the GE Kitchen Hub, a screen/smart home controller designed to sit above your oven.  The Kitchen Hub, which was originally conceived in GE Appliances innovation hub FirstBuild, not only has voice and gesture control capability built in but works with Zigbee and Z-Wave to connect to your smart devices.

You can see Digital Trends video walkthrough with the Kitchen Hub below:

GE Kitchen Hub - Hands On at CES 2018

The concept of the Kitchen Hub sits somewhere between the Amazon and Samsung approach, a device that’s separate from a large appliance (and their long life cycles), but one that is also a built-in. The product is priced in that middle territory as well, coming in at $600.

I like the idea of the Kitchen Hub. A separate built-in screen, one that is more affordably priced than a hybrid appliance/TV product and that can also act as a smart home control center is a potential winner. Of course, a lot will rely on execution, but overall this is an intriguing product to watch.

One thing’s that clear: the battle for the kitchen TV became a lot more interesting at CES 2018. Check back at the Spoon and subscribe to our newsletter to monitor our coverage of this market over the next 12 months.

Podcast: The CES 2018 Smart Kitchen & Foodtech Wrapup Show

CES 2018 is in the books. It was a hectic week packed with smart kitchen news and showcases. Mike was on the floor in Las Vegas and reveals the big trends (voice activation everywhere!), the cool news stuff (guided cooking!), and the countertop dishwasher he calls “sexy.”

Take a listen for all the in-depth analysis you need. You can also subscribe to the Smart Kitchen Show in Apple Podcasts or download it here.

CES: Will the Newest Smart Fridges Be a Smart Buy?

At CES 2018, Samsung and LG continued their tradition of debuting new connected refrigerators that are less about keeping your food cold and more about becoming the center of not only your kitchen, but your life.

Samsung unveiled its new set of Family Hub fridges, which feature a built-in touchscreen and a host of connected features that offer smart-home integration and meal planning as well as information and entertainment services.

The company has expanded support for the SmartThings connected home platform (which Samsung owns). Standing at your Family Hub fridge, you will be able control your smart thermostat and lights, or check video feeds from your connected cameras.

The new Meal Planner feature provides users with recipes based on food preferences, dietary restrictions, and, using the fridge’s internal cameras, the food you already have. A new Deals app helps you find bargains and save them to a shopping list. And the View Inside app lets you remotely check what’s in your fridge, so no more forgetting if you already have broccoli at home while you’re at the store.

Samsung’s voice assistant, Bixby, is built into the fridge and can now recognize more than one voice. So it can tell apart different family members when they speak and bring up personalized information such as calendars, news, weather and updates, depending on who’s talking.

The Family Hub screen can also mirror Samsung TVs, stream content from phones, and access audio and video content like music streaming services as well as HomeAdvisor, Pinterest and Buzzfeed’s Tasty.

Over at LG, the company unveiled its InstaView ThinQ Refrigerator, which sports a 29-inch touchscreen and has the ability to “talk” with other LG ThinQ devices.

LG’s touchscreen adds a bit of magic by turning transparent if you knock on it twice, so you can see what’s inside your fridge without opening the door.

The ThinQ fridge also recommends recipes based on the food you have inside it. And once you’ve picked a recipe, the Alexa-powered fridge will guide you through it on-screen. Then the ThinQ fridge will automatically talk with the ThinQ oven to preheat to the proper temperature, and to the ThinQ dishwasher to select a fitting wash cycle for all those dirty dishes you create making the dish.

The ThinQ also allows you to “Smart Tag” foods in your fridge with information like expiration dates, so your fridge will know when something is about to go bad. Finally, it lets you remotely access the internal camera when out shopping.

Pricing information wasn’t provided, but a quick look at Home Depot shows that existing Family Hub fridges start at $3,000, and the previous generation of LG smart fridges start at $3,600.

That ain’t cheap. But the bigger issue with purchasing a major smart appliance is that technology moves quickly and companies want you to buy into a bigger ecosystem beyond just one appliance.

Most people don’t buy a new fridge every year, let alone five or even ten years. So smart fridges like these beg the question, what happens when the smarts of your fridge get outdated and can no longer run the latest version of of your favorite streaming service? And heaven forbid that your fridge gets bricked.

Then there’s the question of diving into an ecosystem. With the Samsung, you have to use Bixby, not Alexa, so you lose access to that (ubiquitous) Amazon integration. And while the LG makes use of Alexa, if you want it to talk to your oven or your dishwasher, you’ll have to pony up for those LG-branded devices as well.

We love smart kitchen devices here at The Spoon, it’s just that when it comes to major appliances, we like to be extra smart about what we buy.

Amazon Brings Cooking Capabilities To Alexa Smart Home Skill API

While over 50% of Echos end up in the kitchen, a lack of cooking-specific commands and categories within the popular voice assistant’s smart home API has meant few people actually prepare food with Alexa today.

But that could soon change.

That’s because today Amazon introduced built-in cooking controls for cooking appliances into the Alexa smart home API. Initially rolling out in microwaves from Whirlpool and others, the new cooking capabilities will let users define time and temperature parameters and will eventually use the Alexa voice interface to walk through cooking a meal.

From the Alexa developer blog:

Customers are increasingly using voice user interfaces (VUIs) as a hands-free way to manage their lives, and hands-free control is especially valuable when cooking. With the built-in cooking device controls in the Smart Home Skill API, you will make it easier for your customers to control your cloud-connected microwave. Instead of pressing multiple buttons to enable advanced microwave features, your customers can now use their voices. For example, a customer can say “Alexa, defrost three pounds of chicken” or “Alexa, microwave for 50 seconds on high.”

Initially, there are four new capability interfaces in the Smart Home Skill API – Alexa.Cooking, Alexa.Cooking.TimeController, Alexa.TimeHoldController, and Alexa.CookingPresetController. You can leverage these interfaces today for microwaves and for appliances that support preset cooking. The interfaces are designed for future extensibility as support for more cooking devices becomes available.

The new Alexa cooking capability understands food categories (for example, Alexa will take a food term from the Echo user – such as “sockeye salmon” – to categorize food in the “Fish” category) and cooking modes.  Appliance makers are able define their different cooking modes that are discoverable within the Alexa app, which means users will be able to access modes such as “defrost” in products such as Whirlpool’s line of connected microwaves. The new cooking capability from Amazon also allows appliance makers to make their presets libraries available through Alexa.

While Whirlpool’s expected to be the first to launch the new Alexa cooking capability for its connected microwaves (no exact date has been given), Amazon also announced Samsung, GE, Kenmore and LG are all working to bring the new Alexa cooking capability to market.

And finally, one last piece of news embedded in the announcement: The company has invested in June, high profile maker of the June connected oven, via the Alexa fund. This means, of course, you can expect the June oven to work with Alexa’s cooking capabilities sometime in 2018.

Enjoy the podcast and make sure to subscribe in Apple podcasts if you haven’t already.

Is Amazon Considering Making A Smart Fridge? Probably Not (But Maybe)

Is Amazon working on a refrigerator?

Maybe.

Recent patent applications suggest the company is researching advanced refrigerator technology around spoilage detection while they also expand efforts to help you order groceries and have them delivered inside your home. Taken together with their investment in smart home tech and growing interest in the kitchen, one scenario could have the company creating a smart fridge.

Skeptical? You should be. It probably won’t happen. But there are signals it is at least a remote possibility, so let’s analyze them and speculate about the possibility of an Amazon Smart Fridge.

First the patent applications.

Amazon Files Fridge Patents

In September, Amazon filed two related patent applications that centered around spoiled food detection in refrigerators.  The first patent application, filed on September 14th of this year, is called “Image-Based Spoilage Sensing Refrigerator” and centers around utilizing internal cameras to detect spoiled food. The system would use both infrared and visible spectrum cameras to detect spoilage of food and then send an alert to a mobile device.

This patent application was designed to work in concert with a scent-based sensing system defined in another patent application (also filed on September 14th) called “Scent-Based Spoilage Sensing Refrigerator” that utilizes a variety of sensors to detect gasses emitted from spoiled food and then sends an alert to a mobile device.

Here is a mockup drawing of the fridge included in both of the patent applications that show where gas-based spoilage sensors would be placed in the fridge:

Both patent applications go into a lot of detail about how exactly the systems would work, but the essence of these concepts is that Amazon wants to put digital eyes and a nose into your refrigerator to automatically detect when food is spoiled and let you know.

As with any patent applications, you need to take them with a grain of salt. Amazon files a whole lot of patents these days and more often these do not turn into granted patents. But the very fact Amazon is researching spoilage detection is interesting in itself, even if it’s not enough.

Amazon Investment in Kitchen Commerce

For the last few years, Amazon has invested in kitchen replenishment and ordering platforms. First, there’s Amazon Dash Replenishment Service, the integrated automated ordering system that today is largely about replenishing non-spoilables like coffee filters or printer ink. However, there’s no reason why the same technology couldn’t work in a fridge.

Then there’s the Amazon Echo and Alexa. Over half of all Amazon Echos are ending up in the kitchen, and Amazon continues to build out the capabilities of their Alexa-powered voice assistants to act as virtual grocery shoppers.

We’ve also seen Amazon continuing to invest in their own mobile app to enable new commerce possibilities. Just this week the company announced it had added augmented reality capabilities to its mobile app. One could easily imagine the mobile app getting alerts from a smart fridge to tee up a new set of groceries.

Amazon’s Recipe-Driven Commerce Patent

Amazon’s fridge patent applications are no doubt intriguing, but things get even more interesting when considering Amazon IP such as its patent for recipe-driven commerce. Amazon was issued a patent in 2015 to enable for recipe-driven commerce that breaks down a recipe and inserts ingredients into a virtual shopping cart.

Here’s an image from the patent filing showing a recipe with a commerce/shopping cart component:

The patent application was originally filed in 2011, which shows you how long Amazon has been thinking about food and automated ordering.

Amazon Is Investing in Unattended Delivery

Last week, Amazon revealed Amazon Key, a new initiative centered around unattended delivery. The idea here is an Amazon delivery person would be able to enter your home to deliver a product while you aren’t there. The system utilizes an Amazon smart video doorbell and works with smart lock partners to enable access.

While Amazon Key could be used for pretty much anything Amazon delivers, unattended delivery makes lots of sense for groceries given fresh food needs to be put into a fridge at some point. Of course, an Amazon fridge isn’t necessary to make this all happen, but as long as Amazon is moving down the path of automated ordering, it could be one of many potential scenarios.

Amazon’s Partnership With Kenmore

A couple of months ago, Kenmore made news by announcing it would start selling its appliances via Amazon. It was a big deal since this was the first time in the brand’s century-plus history that it would sell outside of a Sears’ sales channel.

As I wrote here, the deal was a big win for Amazon, while Sears/Kenmore will also benefit from Amazon’s e-commerce capabilities. At the same time, Sears continues to struggle and, long-term, this deal could the first step towards new business models where Kenmore works with other players to help develop partner products. Who’s to say that at some point Amazon doesn’t consider working with Kenmore to make a refrigerator or – as they did with Whole Foods – just buy the company?

Amazon Loves Food

This one might seem obvious, but Amazon loves the food business. If the surprising acquisition of Whole Foods wasn’t enough to convince you, certainly their decade-long investment in grocery delivery, experimentation with new store formats, their drive-through pick up concept, Fresh subscriptions and various other initiatives are signs of how excited Amazon is about the food market. And why not? They know along with Walmart that food is the biggest portion of consumer wallet spend outside of housing and transportation (roughly 13% of consumer household budgets go towards food).

Much how Amazon eventually invested in hardware for entertainment because they saw a huge opportunity for new business models as the living room became digitized, who’s to say they won’t think the same thing about food as the kitchen goes through the same digital transformation?

The Fridge Is The Heart Of The Kitchen

In some ways, one could argue the fridge is the heart of the kitchen. Samsung certainly thinks so, doubling down on a strategy around their Family Hub refrigerator this year and likely continuing to bet on the smart fridge. Rumors have been floating for the last couple years that Amazon was making a kitchen computer – which eventually turned into was the Echo Show – but who’s to say Amazon wouldn’t just consider moving the technology for the Show into the fridge itself alongside all the other tech they are have developed for the kitchen?

All The Reasons They Won’t Make a Fridge

As I said, there are lots of reasons not to make a fridge. One is the company usually invests in smaller, low-cost hardware products in new categories. Another is there’s a good chance that if Amazon wanted inside our fridge, they would simply consider making a retrofit solution similar to the Smarter fridge cam.  And if they wanted to make a home storage device, why not just make a front-door locker system, something akin to an Amazon locker for the front door?

But still…

Conclusion: Gene Munster, My Apologies

The Amazon fridge question reminds me of a few years ago when folks speculated whether Apple would make a TV. One analyst in particular, Gene Munster, seemed to bet his whole career on the idea before eventually admitting he’d been wrong.

Part of the reason Munster speculated for years about an Apple TV was there were lots of signals.  Patent filings, investment in digital entertainment platforms and the recurring pattern of Apple coming up with a new hero consumer product every couple years fed into Munster’s thinking.

So, while I don’t intend to become the Gene Munster of the Amazon fridge and wage a multiyear speculation battle about why its the right thing to do, I figured I’d at least play Munster for a day and ask the question: will Amazon make a smart fridge?

Probably not.

Buy maybe.

The IFA 2017 Smart Refrigerator Roundup

Fridges are sexy again.

Ok, so maybe they weren’t ever sexy in the first place, but if you were at IFA this past week, you would have seen a host of fridges with interactive touchscreens, image recognition software, internal cams and even the ability to move around the home and deliver a frosty one.

If this year’s CES and IFA are any indications, the fridge is fast becoming the focal point for many appliance makers, who are jumping at the opportunity to remake their product with advanced hardware and software that transform their fridges into the smart kitchen – and smart home – hubs.

Let’s take a quick look at some of the fridges that were on display at IFA:

Haier Link Cook Series

Haier showed off their Link Cook series of smart refrigerators, a new line of products that looks similar in feature set to the Samsung Family Hub refrigerator.

Haier smart fridge "Link Cook" @IFA 2017

The Link Cook series of fridges is part of a broader lineup from Haier. According to Ashlee Clark Thompson at CNET, the Link Cook is part of “Haier’s U+ Smart Home Platform, which connects the Link Cook Series to a Haier oven and range hood. According to Haier, you’ll be able to select a recipe on the refrigerator, automatically send the heating instructions to the oven and view the recipe on a small screen on the range hood.”

At this point, Haier is vague on timing and pricing. It will be interesting to see is if Haier’s new fridge eventually enters the US market under the GE brand.

Samsung’s Family Hub

Samsung tends to make its biggest news at CES, but it had a nice update on some new features and partner integrations for its flagship smart fridge at IFA.

While the company has had voice commands (both Alexa and its voice assistant, Bixby), they announced expanded voice command features at IFA. From the press release: “Family Hub’s voice capabilities provide a new way to interact with the refrigerator. Users can ask for the time and weather updates, search the internet, read news articles, play music and radio, add items to their shopping list, and even view inside of the refrigerator without opening the door.”

It also became more evident that Samsung sees their Family Hub as the central command center for the smart home. They teased this at CES and at the Smart Kitchen event at Samsung’s NYC location in June, but now users can use the Samsung Connect smart home features from the fridge. Samsung Connect, based on the SmartThings platform (which Samsung acquired a few years ago), is now built into the fridge.

Panasonic’s Mobile Fridge

Panasonic turned in one of the most intriguing showings of IFA as far as future kitchen tech is concerned, showing off an AI-powered kitchen assistant and a combo microwave-steam oven, but the show stealer was their moveable fridge named “Cool.”  Cool utilizes similar technology employed by any number of robot vacuums in that it has internal sensors that measure the distance between itself and obstacles in its way like, say, a kitchen island, and continuously develops a map and improves its understanding of the overall home layout as moves around.

Cool, which is about the size of a dormitory fridge, does not currently have a price or ship date.

Smarter/Liebherr

The smart fridge showing at IFA wasn’t all touch screens and robot fridges. Smarter, the smart kitchen appliance startup from the UK founded by Dragon Den wunderkind Christian Lane and his wife Isabella, showed off production models of the smart fridge cam is debuted last year at IFA and also had a major partner announcement. The company announced that their FridgeCam smart fridge camera would ship with every smart refrigerator from German industrial conglomerate Liebherr, the biggest privately held manufacturer of refrigerators in the EU (and also the inventor of the tower crane).  The deal is a good one for Smarter. While the announcement did not break out what percentage of total volume from the German manufacturer is smart, the company ships an estimated 2 million fridges per year.

The Rise of the Smart Fridge

In many ways, this focus on the fridge by big appliance manufacturer makes sense. In many homes, the fridge is the central focal point of the kitchen, where pictures, school assignments, and shopping lists go. Why not digitize that?

The fridge is also where the bulk of our fresh food is stored, all of which have a limited lifespan. Smarter fridges could help us manage this inventory and make sure we waste less (and keep us from buying redundant food that will inevitably be wasted).

Lastly, no platform really dominates the kitchen screen, but with the rise of guided cooking, the growing popularity of food and cooking content, and more and smarter appliances to manage, the front of the fridge makes sense for that big attractive touchscreen.

And of course, there are those of us there are who have long dreamed of a day when a robot assistant could bring us a beer. Just who could have predicted that robot would also be a fridge?

Bosch’s Friendly Kitchen Robot Shows Off Sous Chef Skills At IFA 2017

When Bosch showed off their kitchen assistant Mykie at last year’s IFA and a few months later at CES, the social robot did little more than project a looped video suggesting how he might help out in the kitchen.

But at this year’s IFA, the little guy seemed all grown up as he showed off a voice-powered interactive demo of guided cooking. In the video captured below, you can see the user giving voice commands to navigate Mykie from step to step, watch recipe preparation instructions, search the web and watch videos of pro cooks preparing the food.

It’s an interesting evolution of Mykie in what is fast becoming a more competitive market for AI powered sous chefs. This year we’ve seen everyone from Buzzfeed Tasty to Whirlpool join others like the Hestan Cue and Cuciniale with guided cooking platforms, while Amazon and Samsung are creating what are voice-powered kitchen computers as extensions of their existing AI and app platforms.

By giving Mykie a name and cute little robot face, Bosch is betting consumers will embrace AI assistants with a little personality. Compared with the faceless Alexa, Mykie certainly seems warmer and one that might even become something of a “friend” in the kitchen. Of course, whether we as consumers will befriend the likes of Mykie is part of a longer-term question around just how realistic home robots and AI assistants become.

Bosch representatives at IFA were still vague on when we might see Mykie make it to market. With CES in just a few months, you have to wonder if the German appliance giant will reveal details in Las Vegas about when consumers might have their own kitchen assistant with a friendly face to help them make dinner.

The Battle For The ‘Kitchen Screen’ Has Just Begun. Here’s The Leading Contenders

Back in the year 2000, the world’s first Internet-connected refrigerator was introduced. Made by LG, the Digital DIOS came with a webcam, an Ethernet port and perhaps most importantly, an LCD touchscreen.

The fridge was one of the first examples of an appliance with a digital screen created specifically for the consumer kitchen, but with a $20 thousand price tag, consumers stayed away.  Today, nearly two decades after the introduction of the world’s first smart fridge, some of the world’s biggest consumer electronics companies are rushing to put screens back into the kitchen again.

Why now? There are a few reasons, but most come back to one simple truth: today’s kitchen is becoming the home’s central gathering place, where people not only come to make meals but also to hang out with friends, pay bills or do homework. In other words, the kitchen has become the modern home’s ‘everything room’, and unlike the family room where a TV or family computer often resides, there’s no defined product today in the kitchen that’s accepted as the go-to screen for family members to share information, manage home systems, keep tabs on things and communicate with one another.

Not that some companies aren’t trying. Here’s a look at the leading contenders:

Refrigerators

With ample flat surface space and usually centered in the middle of the kitchen, you can see why appliance makers see the fridge as the logical place to put a big digital screen. And unlike past efforts where companies would sometimes slap a screen on a fridge with limited functionality, today’s smart fridges have big, high-definition LED touch screens. The Samsung Family Hub’s screen is 21.5″, while LG’s Smart Instaview refrigerator has a huge 29″ screen.

Pros: The main advantage of having the refrigerator act as a family’s community screen is the simple fact the fridge has long served as the home’s de facto analog bulletin board, where families stick shopping lists, family pictures, and calendars. Given what seems a natural progression for the fridge to become the home’s digital command center, it’s no surprise companies have been pursuing the idea of the smart fridge for two decades.

Cons: The biggest challenge fridges face in becoming the main ‘family screen’ is simple: these are devices that are meant to stay in a house for ten years or more. This long lifespan is much different from traditional computing devices, such as mobile phones or tablets, which typically have much faster replacement cycles.  Consumers plopping down $2,500 for the latest fridge are going to want their new device to last for at least a decade, no matter how smart they are when they purchase them.

Smart Assistants

Though the Amazon Echo is only a couple years old, its success has create a whole new category of devices alternatively called ‘smart speakers’ or ‘virtual assistants’ (for our purposes I’ll call them ‘smart assistants’, since not all are speakers and the hardware part beyond the voice assistant is hardly virtual).

And now, the company’s new Echo Show represents an entirely new and exciting direction, with a 7″ touch screen and a new visual skill API that allows third party developers to create skills that leverage visual information such as live stream video from a networked camera or cooking videos from Twitch.

And let’s not forget HelloEgg, a smart assistant with an embedded visual display designed specifically for the kitchen created by a company called RND64 that is expected to ship this year.

Pros: Unlike a heavy appliance like a fridge, smart assistant products can be purchased and installed anywhere on a countertop.  In a way, they’re like a highly optimized tablet, but instead of being a personal computing device they’re created to act as a shared screen. In many ways, the Echo Show is Amazon’s concept of a kitchen computer.

Cons: The touchscreen enabled smart assistant category is just simply too new to know how well it will do with consumers. While the Amazon Echo and other smart assistant products are no doubt becoming popular, it’s just a little soon to see how popular smart assistants with touchscreen will be.

Kitchen Counters And Flat Surfaces

The concept of using the kitchen counter as a Minority Report like interactive touch screen has been bouncing around in future-forward design studios for much of the past decade and, in the past couple years, big kitchen electronics makers like Whirlpool have even toyed with the idea of the countertop touch screen.

IKEA Concept Kitchen 2025

Pros: First and foremost, the idea of your surface as interactive computing screen is just cool. It also offers an extremely flexible and dynamic format to display information and adjust to specific design needs of a kitchen.

Cons: While the idea has been floating around and touted by such big brands like Whirlpool and IKEA, a projected surface touchscreen has yet to roll out in any significant way in a mass market consumer product.

Kitchen-Centric PCs

For a hot moment back in 2008-9, some in the computer industry decided that since people spend lots of time in the kitchen, they should create a line of Kitchen PCs. The idea wasn’t altogether bad since, in some ways, was a predecessor concept to the Echo Show since these products centered around the early touchscreen Windows PCs. But not surprisingly, the late aughts “kitchen PC” movement fizzled out as quickly as it started.

Pros: The idea of a kitchen computer with a touchscreen is not a bad idea, and lots of people actually have their PCs in the kitchen.

Cons: These devices were just Windows PCs with touchscreens that were very much a product of 2009.

The Microwave Oven

The fridge isn’t the only device where a screen could reside. In fact, a decade ago appliance giant Whirlpool toyed around with the concept of putting a TV screen on a microwave oven. While they never rolled the product out to market, others have since toyed around with the idea.

Games Console Microwave

Pros: Some appliances, like the microwave, are nearly as prevalent as refrigerators. Chances are a touchscreen enabled microwave would likely be much less expensive than a smart fridge.

Cons: At this point, I know of no product company that is considering a smart microwave, perhaps because of the complications of sticking a flat screen computing device on the front of a microwave. Not to say someone couldn’t surprise me, but this one seems to be the domain of tinkerers and video-bloggers at this point.

Bottom line, we’re likely to see many more screens in the kitchen in coming years. Unlike the personal computing devices most of us carry in our pockets or backpacks, these “kitchen screen” will be tailored for shared use and act as a modern equivalent of family bulletin board/digital command center for the modern home.

The only open question is exactly which device will it be.

The Smart Kitchen Summit is around the corner. Get your ticket today before early bird ticket pricing before it expires to make sure you are the the one and only event focused on the future of food, cooking and the kitchen. 

Samsung’s Latest Smart Fridge Is Here

Samsung’s been working on connected appliances for years and the company’s flagship smart fridge feels like a personification of the vision they have for the connected kitchen. Today Samsung is unveiling their next generation Family Hub with stronger app integration and a series of new partners to enhance features like family communication and grocery to fridge food shopping.

“The Family Hub is a huge step forward in the modern kitchen. It empowers you to do things you never thought possible – like take the fridge with you to the grocery store, digitally display a photo of your kids’ winning goal, and enjoy your favorite entertainment right from your digital screen,” commented John Herrington, Samsung’s SVP and General Manager of the Home Appliance Division.

The appliance giant is revealing the smart fridge’s advancements tonight at an event in partnership with the Smart Kitchen Summit; the event will bring together experts in kitchen trends, product innovation and cultural anthropology for a panel discussion today at Samsung’s experiential retail center in NYC.

The event, “More Than Just a Fridge: The Future of Food, Family & Fun in the Kitchen,” features Samsung execs including Herrington and Yoon Lee, Michael Wolf, curator of the Smart Kitchen Summit and publisher of The Spoon, Lisa Fetterman, CEO and founder of sous vide startup Nomiku, Christian Madsbjerg, Cultural Anthropologist and Amy Bentley, Food + Culture Professor at NYU. Programming at the event will tackle why the kitchen has become the hub of the home, how the kitchen is evolving to serve the changing needs of multi-generational families and how technology is created convenience and connection in the kitchen.

The Family Hub fridges will add new features including personal memos and photos on the digital touchscreen, partnerships with TuneIn and Spotify for music streaming and integration with Samsung TVs to push programming to the fridge’s front door screen.

This latest edition of Samsung’s smart fridge will also feature the Connect app, the company’s smart home control app introduced earlier this year on the Galaxy S8. By putting the Connect app on the Family Hub fridge, the appliance can now act as a smart home command center if they have a SmartThings hub or the Samsung new Connect Home Smart Wi-Fi system with an integrated SmartThings hub.

The new Family Hub also has integration with a number of cooking applications and services such as Allrecipes and GrubHub. The device will also work with Nomiku’s immersion circulator, which is an integration by-product of Samsung’s investment in Nomiku.

(Disclosure: The Smart Kitchen Summit and Samsung partnered to produce the event mentioned in this post.)

Smart Kitchen Summit 2017 Announces First Round Of Speakers

The Smart Kitchen Summit is back for its third – and biggest – year yet. Heading back to Benaroya Hall on October 10 and 11 in Seattle, the Summit will once again bring together the who’s who of the smart kitchen world. A combination of leaders from the worlds of Big Food, tech, commerce, culinary, design, delivery and smart home, SKS speakers, sponsors and attendees represent some of the biggest names in their respective industries.

The 2017 Smart Kitchen Summit agenda will be live in the next few weeks, but the Summit crew has started to announce the first round of speakers for this year and it is filled with rockstar talent. Notable speakers this year include CTO of Barilla, Victoria Spadaro Grant who will speak to the role of technology and innovation in the world of Big Food as well as Neil Grimmer, CEO and founder of personalized meal kit delivery startup Habit.

Because the consumer kitchen and consumer food preferences are constantly being influenced, SKS will welcome Top Chef alum and owner of ink, Chef Michael Voltaggio.

The Summit will explore the how the smart appliance is changing in the face of new interface, delivery, commerce and technology models; appliance leaders Yoon Lee, senior VP of innovation at Samsung along with Ola Nilsson, CEO of Electrolux’s small appliance group will join us for those discussions.

With innovation in food tech and the connected kitchen moving so rapidly, Summit themes around business models and startups will help attendees think about their own product roadmaps and understand where the space is headed.  Evan Dash, CEO of StoreBound will be on hand to discuss how his company is helping to bring to market such products the the PancakeBot and SoBro, through a fully integrated model of a go-to-market pipeline.

The Smart Kitchen Summit has also drawn an elite group of journalists who are covering and looking at how technology is transforming the way we eat, shop for and cook our food. Maura Judkis, food and culture reporter for the Washington Post, Ashlee Clark Thompson, associate editor at CNET, Carley Knobloch from the HGTV Smart Home, Lisa McManus from America’s Test Kitchen, Keith Barry, editor-in-chief of Reviewed.com (owned by USA Today) and Amanda Rottier, Product Director of Cooking at the New York Times, will all help facilitate discussions.

Other 2017 Smart Kitchen Summit speakers include:

For the full list of speakers and 2017 sponsors and partners, visit the SKS website.

No other event brings together the decision makers and disrupters from across the food, cooking, appliance, retail and technology ecosystems like SKS. Join us on October 10 and 11 in Seattle to connect with new people, find partners, see the latest technology and startup demonstrations, hear the leaders of the space and make deals.

Early bird tickets are on sale now through July 31, 2017 and if you use code SPOON, you can get 20% off tickets through the end of this month. So, if you want to grab a front row seat as we map the future of cooking and the kitchen, register now.