Historically speaking, August is a slow month for new tech developments, but clearly not everyone in the industry has hightailed it to the beach. The past week held a few notable announcements from the restaurant tech world, including developments from Domino’s and new takes on existing tech in both the front and back of house. Here’s a quick look:
Domino’s Launches Innovation Garage
It seems Domino’s is in the news every other week for tech developments to make its delivery process as fast and friction-free as possible. That won’t change any time soon: the company announced this week the opening of its Innovation Garage, a 33,000-square-foot space in Domino’s hometown of Ann Arbor, MI that will be ground zero for testing all manner of tech-related initiatives. Self-service kiosks, autonomous vehicles, GPS delivery tracking, and Domino’s AnyWare ordering technology were a few items mentioned in the press release.
Image via Unsplash.
TripAdvisor Adds Wi-Fi Offering for Restaurants
TripAdvisor this week launched a service called Wi-Fi Plus, which will allow restaurants to offer customers free wi-fi in exchange for their contact information. Customers who opt in will receive the inevitable automated marketing messages that usually follow the handing over of one’s email addy, and will be encouraged to leave more TripAdvisor reviews about their restaurant experience. The restaurants, meanwhile, will get more access to potentially valuable customer data, and hopefully a business boost in the process. When reporting the news, RestaurantDive cited a recent study that claims 65 percent of restaurant guests say wi-fi is a must for quick-service restaurants.
GND Solutions Fights Restaurant Food Waste With Semtech Integration
This week IoT provider GND Solutions announced it is integrating Semtech Corp’s LoRa devices and the open LoRaWAN protocol into its new smart refrigeration solutions for restaurants. The GLoSe-916T device from GND is a wireless IoT door alert sensor that will immediately notify the restaurant when a fridge door opens or closes, and will also monitor humidity and temperature. The hope is that more real-time data on these factors can help restaurant managers eliminate food waste by cutting down on human error (e.g., accidentally leaving the fridge door open). The sensors integrate with the fridge without the need for additional wiring, and can accurately report temperatures between -40°C and 100°C.
Want more restaurant tech? We’ll be covering plenty of it at the Smart Kitchen Summit this October in Seattle. Grab your tickets here.
Leave a Reply