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The Spoon

Daily news and analysis about the food tech revolution

voice AI

ConverseNow Acquires Drive-Thru Voice AI Specialist Valyant AI

Today, ConverseNow announced that it has acquired drive-thru conversational AI specialist Valyant AI. According to the announcement about the deal – the terms of which were not disclosed – the entire Valyant AI team will be retained post-acquisition.

Until now, ConverseNow has largely succeeded in winning restaurant chain business through call center voice automation. With this deal, ConverseNow brings a drive-thru AI specialist into the fold, jumpstarting its efforts to penetrate the growing market for AI-voice-assisted drive-thru technology.

Valyant AI, which started quickly out of the gate in 2019 with a win at a Techcrunch automation and AI pitch competition in 2019, has since run trials with its Holly voice AI at CKE and Checkers. The company’s technology, which is differentiated from ConverseNow’s in that the AI runs locally on proprietary hardware (ConverseNow’s AI runs in the cloud), also includes a generative AI training application called AI Employee Assist, which restaurant staff can ask questions and receive instant responses. According to the announcement, the Valyant AI technology will be integrated into both the drive-thru and tables by the end of Q3.

The deal is another signal that the restaurant voice AI and automation is heating up. Other providers, such as Presto and Soundhound, have been growing their installed base for both phone and drive-thru automation solutions, while large chains like Wendy’s have been developing their own voice AI technology. McDonald’s, which had been running a trial of voice assistant powered by IBM, recently announced they were sunsetting the initiative and would evaluate other voice AI technologies and select another solution by the year’s end.

Beyond the obvious employee cost-saving benefits of voice automation, QSRs also see opportunities to increase total order size through upselling capabilities. According to ConverseNow, its technology can detect conversational nuances and personalize orders based on contextual data and information gained in real time during the order process.

Jersey Mike’s Jumps on the AI-Voice Order Bandwagon as it Deploys Soundhound to 50 Locations

The AI-voice bot customer service wave is coming at us fast, and the latest chain to roll out the technology is the sub-sandwich chain Jersey Mike’s.

Soundhound announced this week that Jersey Mike’s will deploy its voice AI ordering system to allow customers to place orders by phone. According to Soundhound, the AI has been trained on the entire Jersey Mike’s menu and can handle order placement and answer queries about menu items, specials, store information, and more, all while ensuring orders are taken accurately and efficiently.

The video below shows Soundhound’s Jersey Mike integration in action.

DEMO: Jersey Mike's Automated Phone Ordering System - Powered by SoundHound AI

Like many voice AIs, it sounds about 90% natural in action, but there’s still something of an Uncanny Valley stiltedness to it. Listening to the order, it seems to handle the natural conversation flow deftly, but I have to wonder just how nimble it is with various dialects and slang, which can be a natural part of incoming phone orders.

Soundhound, a company that’s been around since the mid-aughts and had focused on auto installations and music until its move into customer service interaction layers for restaurants and retail over the past couple of years, announced the acquisition of SYNQ3 Restaurant Solutions last month. At the time of the deal, Soundhound said the merger extended “its market reach by an order of magnitude to over 10,000 signed locations and accelerating the deployment of leading-edge generative AI capabilities to the industry.”

Soundhound isn’t alone in chasing fast food chains to provide voice AI customer service platforms. Par Technologies, ConverseNow, and OpenCity also offer third-party solutions, while some players, like McDonald’s, have brought voice AI in-house through acquisition.

After a decade of pushing towards digital ordering kiosks and new ways to serve customers in-store and through apps, AI-powered customer service layers have moved to the top of the list for many big chains, including Jersey Mike’s.

Samsung Adds Bixby AI To Family Hub Fridges

When Samsung debuted Bixby, its AI-enabled home assistant on Galaxy S8 phones, we wondered how well it would do as an Amazon Echo or Google Home competitor. After all, carrying your phone from room to room to control your smart home with voice makes about as much sense as….carrying your phone room to room to control your smart home with an app.

But it didn’t take Samsung long to take Bixby out of the phone and put it in some of its existing smart appliances – namely, the mother of all smart appliances, the Samsung Family Hub 2.0.

The Family Hub debuted at CES several years ago, with a giant touchscreen interface on the front and all kinds of interesting kitchen functions, including grocery ordering and to-do lists for family members. But Samsung clearly had plans to use the technology they were building inside these fridges as more than just glorified tablets.

On Sunday, Samsung announced it will include Bixby’s AI functionality inside Family Hub fridges, allowing users to search for recipes and ask Bixby for news and weather – very similar to competitive AI-powered speakers. But the Family Hub also allows for food ordering through partners such as Nomiku (sous vide company making sous vide-ready meal kits) and Grubhub and with the native voice functions paired with the touchscreen, along with possible connectivity to Samsung’s other smart devices in the home, it makes for an interesting voice solution in the kitchen. Samsung recently invested in Nomiku as they launched their RFID meal kits and laid out clear plans to form a cohesive ecosystem in the kitchen.

According to Pulse News in Korea,

“Bixby’s deep learning will enable the fridge to control temperature automatically, call up recipes based on user’s eating habits or recommend favorite music.”

Samsung recently invested in Nomiku as they launched their RFID meal kits and laid out clear plans to form a cohesive ecosystem in the kitchen. From Mike’s piece on the investment and news, “Fetterman said Samsung plans integrate the Nomiku with their smart home platform, SmartThings….However, the consumer electronics giant has been fairly successful in their effort to integrate SmartThings with their various product lines in the home such as appliances and TVs. While Samsung had previously announced an integration of SmartThings with their own Wi-Fi ovens, Nomiku appears to be the first small precision cooking appliance integrated with the SmartThings smart home platform.”

Current Family Hub users can also get upgraded to include Bixby functionality inside their fridges through a software update – a nice feature for a pricey appliance that we’ve often wondered how appliance giants plan to support with new functionality coming out regularly.

The install of Bixby has just begun and the updates aren’t rolled out yet. But soon, the voice in the kitchen might be your fridge telling you what’s for dinner.