The arrival of robots in bars and restaurants has intensified to the point that these machines are beginning to be part of the regular landscape of establishments of different sizes. Although its development is incipient compared to other sectors, such as industrial, and other markets, such as Asia, more and more units of this type are seen lending a hand to waiters.
VIPS and Foster’s Hollywood, restaurant brands belonging to Alsea, have trusted the integration and consulting company Robot Components to gradually incorporate robots into their workforce. Currently they have around twenty of these assistants, but the forecast is to increase that number in the short term.
The automaton responds to the name of Charly and collaborates in clearing tables. This, among others, is its mission, to support less qualified work. Each unit has the capacity to move up to four trays of 15 kilos each (30-40 tons per month on average). Charly is equipped with vision cameras, depth cameras and lidars to navigate the room reliably and accurately.
«Apart from working as a consultant to offer the best robotic and automation solutions to each client, we also have our own manufacturing, with a national network of specialized maintenance and assistance, this being a fundamental part when integrating these new services into any company» says Juan Antonio García Navarro, COO of Robot Componentes, a multi-brand company that seeks to “increase services and productivity.”
Work relief
The collaboration with Alsea aims to relieve the employee of certain tasks, he indicates: «It is about preventing waiters from carrying weight continuously. This minimizes fatigue, tiredness and its derivatives such as sick leave, substantially increasing the well-being of the workforce. The staff also has more time for direct attention to the public. And it improves customer satisfaction, shortening service times and even increasing the average ticket, since the public has a waiter at their disposal for longer.”
The fear that robotization will affect the elimination of jobs is installed in society. However, the vision of the company’s COO is hopeful: «Many other jobs, more technical, will be created for installations, programming, repairs and many other nearby services that machines will not supply. In general, they will create wealth and well-being for the entire society. Robot Componentes takes care of the updating and technical maintenance of the machines. Its clients include the Barceló hotel group, the Grupo Confuego restaurant chain and the retail part of the French multinational La Gardère. Internationalization is another of the firm’s axes. It participates in projects at the European level and has opened a technical, commercial and service office in Mexico.
José Luis del Val, professor at the Faculty of Engineering at the University of Deusto, analyzes the evolution of the use of these machines: «The trend towards robotization in industry is very advanced and in others it is incipient, but it will surely grow and Therefore, in the hospitality industry as well, although the experiences in this sector so far have been more about marketing or attracting attention than about producing a real benefit.
The teacher misses the capabilities of these gadgets: “They need to be agile, fast and efficient enough to be profitable in widespread deployment. There are robots that serve coffee, they even serve beer or bring menus to the tables, but they are not yet very autonomous, nor very fast, nor very efficient.
These types of solutions also have a marketing element, of attracting attention
The World Robotics 2024 report, recently published by the International Federation of Robotics, shows the significant growth in the implementation of robots in factories around the world. The nation that uses the most industrial robots is the Republic of Koreawith 1,012 robots per 10,000 employees. Singapore and China complete the podium. Industrial robotization marks the roadmap for incipient social robotization, where Europe has a long way to go.
«In Asia – explains José Luis del Val – they have a completely different relationship with technology. In Shanghai, pizzas have been delivered with drones for years, while in Europe they cannot fly in inhabited areas for safety reasons. «In these countries there are restaurants with lanes that circulate above the row of tables. The trays travel along these lanes and stop in front of the diner. The place is already designed so that there are no waiters,” he details. He does not believe that we are going to reach Asian power: «We are still far from an all-automated restaurant without people to serve. The technology is not mature. Where there is most innovation in this sense is in hotels. “Robots work and have been deployed in places where tasks are very repetitive.”
A robot processes food in a restaurant in Hefei (China)
Regarding the danger to employment, Del Val considers that “in the world of hospitality, perhaps the one who is putting coffees in an airport will be replaced by a robot.” “Although people will always be needed because we evaluate situations and are capable of making decisions,” he adds.
Sena Robotics, from the Paythunder group, is a company located in Córdoba, which sells directly to distributors. One of them, Conbot, has implemented a collaborative robot in the Abrassame restaurant in Barcelona. Sandra Marín, CEO of Sena Robotics, clarifies that they are “manufacturers and importers, and also develop custom software.” In hospitality, its robots act as waiter assistants. «Dishes can be taken from the kitchen to the living room without the waiter having to move from one place to another. Or the other way around, when it is picked up and carried with dirty dishes to the kitchen,” he says.
Leisure and service
Marín maintains that they are all advantages: «It is a product that customers and employees soon get used to. The audience finds it funny and keeps them entertained. It’s an experience. And the waiter is freed from carrying out heavy tasks. “A robot can travel 12 to 15 kilometers loaded with dishes on a weekend.”
There are also benefits for the businessman, he says: “It is providing better service because the waiters focus on serving the customer. And it also has tax advantages because the costs involved in the robot are deductible as business expenses. And it becomes a benchmark for innovation, which helps to have more visibility both in networks and in the press.
Science fiction literature and cinema have generated an image of a robot that can interact with humans. Marín dismantles the myth: «We are not at that level where the robot makes decisions by itself, nor can it interact in that way that we see in the movies. “We haven’t gotten to that point.” It will be for the next round…
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