McDonald’s abandons artificial intelligence: the system designed to collect orders and installed in some restaurants drive-through, has in fact made some mess in collecting the orders that users gave from the seat of their car. Automated Order Taking had given rise to some daring culinary combinations, or misunderstandings that were difficult to manage, as reported by several users on social media: topping of bacon on an ice cream, but also unsolicited supplies of hundreds of “nuggets”, the chicken nuggets characteristic of the fast-food chain. In other cases, simple problems arose in completing and sending orders.
Difficulties
Mason Smoot, Chief Restaurant Officer of McDonald’s USA, was therefore forced to announce: «After careful consideration, McDonald’s has decided to end our current partnership with IBM for AOT and the technology will be deactivated in all restaurants that use it. they are testing by July 26, 2024.” The system, in fact, was developed in a partnership with IBM, one of the main IT multinationals. The trial began in 2021, and involved only a small part of the 13,000 McDonald’s outlets in the States. Second CNBCat the root of the communications problem between customers and software is the latter’s difficulty understanding dialects and accents.
The competitors
Meanwhile, the fast-food chain’s competitors have adopted similar solutions with greater success: Wendy’s relies on Google Cloud for counter orders drive-through, successful in 86% of cases. Carl’s Jr. sandwiches and Taco John’s burritos rely on Presto, with a success rate of up to 90%. David Henkes, an expert in the field quoted by Wired, pointed out that “AI will clearly be part of restaurant automation and efficiency, but the technology is still in its infancy. McDonald’s experience and commitment to AI shows the potential benefits, but also the limitations of the technology today.”
