A new wave of investments in automation is expected to eliminate 20% to 25% of current jobs by 2030 (40 million displaced jobs). In the latest installment of robots taking jobs, we have found a robot dishwasher that threatens to replace 550,000 jobs in the coming years.
A startup called Dishcraft Robotics is set to disrupt commercial kitchens with robot dishwashers. The new robot is designed to reduce the time and energy that humans spend washing plates by using automation to make sure dishes are cleaned faster and cheaper than a typical human.
CEO and founder Linda Pouliot and CTO Paul Birkmeye figured out through careful examination of restaurants that robots haven’t disrupted the dish room as it has remained the same for decades.
In a typical restaurant, dishwashers could break plates and or glasses, get burned and even slip on the wet floor, Birkmeyer noticed. Getting someone to scrub dishes all-day was one of the most challenging jobs in the kitchen to fill, he stated.
“We found the problem is universal. It didn’t matter if you were the French Laundry, a hospital cafeteria or Chili’s; everyone is having a hard time hiring dishwashers,” Pouliot said.
To solve the uncertainties in the dish room, Dishcraft’s robotic system gives restaurants a more sustainable, less costly option than humans.
The new system has four main components: a dish drop, robotic dishwasher, rolling racks, and a sanitizing machine.
First, dishes are pre-sorted and stacked in carts by humans. The cart is then wheeled into the Dishcraft system, a robot arm then uses magnets to pick up a dirty dish and places it in a washer.
After the dish is cleaned with special scrubbers, it’s rotated and examined for cleanliness using computer vision and machine learning algorithms.
Restaurants like the Dishcraft because “Robots do not call off, robots don’t take breaks, and robots do not take vacation,” Pouliot said.
Dishcraft’s main goal is to remove the human element from the kitchen.
The US economy is in the midst of a significant transformation of its economy – one where automation, artificial intelligence, and robotics will take over. These forces will disrupt at least 40 million jobs in the next ten years, and as we’ve shown in this latest piece, robots are now coming for dishwashers.
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Amazing
Will these robots slow down the hordes crossing the border?
If programmed to. We must be careful with that which we “sew the wind.” The scariest line in the “Terminator” was “Skynet became self aware.” Skynet decided it didn’t like us. OOPS.
Clever but . . . how long before the process no longer needs a “mule” to feed it with loaded racks? How much water does it use? How hard is it to clean after IT cleans? How sanitary is the system overall? That is, can it be combined with the typical commercial chemicals that are already available/used/approved by health codes in a typical restaurant kitchen for cleaning/sanitizing, or does it have its own proprietary system? How many cycles before it needs maintenance? How much does maintenance run per hour? How much for the machine? How long before it pays for itself . . . ?
Those robots for places like McDonalds have a payback of about 6-8 months if I recall correctly. Meaning if they only get a year per unit they are saving/making BIG money.
Using internet availble data on simple robots I calculated less than two years in a 24 hour per day operation. The O&M cost in year three was a fraction of a person’s cost. I think it was in response to Walmart using robots. Regardless of the right answer, business will use robots to reduce hiring and legacy costs.
“First, dishes are pre-sorted and stacked in carts by humans.” Look at that grinning female engineer. Unaware the failure is already baked in. She needs to be home washing dishes.
What do you do when the machine breaks down?
Remember those old house of the future cartoons where the mice or chipmunks had house robots flinging dishes?
The day we have robot baristas is the day the government implements guaranteed annual income.
The liberals need to get a check from somewhere.
You will either get a UBI or extreme turd world poverty. Pick your poison.
My building has a traditional Starbucks on the ground level and two Starbucks computerized coffee-makers within the building on the full-service lunchroom floor. I keep wondering if the Starbucks employees on the ground floor are made nervous for their future employment by the computerized coffeemaker in the lunchroom, competing for their job…
We will need many of these. No one with a degree in gender studies or African history would stoop to such menial labor, as to which their degrees attest. They will exist on welfare before stooping to such indignity. Yes, we will need quite a many.
So does this mean we no longer need the immigrants to do all the jobs Americans won’t do?
It’s a dishwasher.
Having worked as a pro dishwasher at numerous establishments, I can tell you that this machine will not replace many humans. A human dishwasher cleans paper and uneaten food off of trays coming in from the dining room, puts glasses, silverware, plates and bowls in racks which usually are on a conveyor belt. The primadonna waitstaff, who must stay clean and presentable anyway, usually will not do this task.
After the cleaning cycle, the dishwasher unloads the trays, sorts the contents and brings the sorted stuff to it where it goes. They also (usually by hand) clean all the pots and pans, knives, ladles etc., most of which are large and awkward to handle. Commercial dish washing machines do a damn good job in most cases, the exceptions being egg yolks on plates and casserole dishes with baked on food.
In smaller establishments dishwashers may get pulled into food prep duties. Ever wonder who sliced your onion rings and peeled your shrimp? Yep. Might have been me.
Dishwashers take trash out to dumpsters, usually handle custodial tasks, and always handle custodial emergencies, such as when a patron of the establishment tries to build a toilet paper nest in the ladies room, or vomits on the potted fig tree.
The place where this machine could cut labor costs is in a very large cafeteria such as at a university, with docile, trainable patrons, few dish varieties, and a high volume of plates. If they have six people washing dishes with each meal they might be able to do with one less. In your typical kitchen with one or two dishwashers? Fugedaboutit.
“Getting someone to scrub dishes all-day was one of the most challenging jobs in the kitchen to fill, he stated.”
No kidding…it has always been a lousy job, one that only the most desperate will accept at the slave-wages offered by the restaurant industry. When I was in high school, I worked in the restaurant industry part time, and sometimes got involuntarily drafted to fill in for a dishwasher who called in “sick.” It certainly motivated me to complete my education and qualify for better job opportunities.
So, it’s going to be cheaper to buy a computer slave and to pay for the technician contract to maintain and service it, than to pay humans a decent wage to perform this work? Seems questionable.
Exactly how is this an advancement from the old cafeteria dishwasher where the dishwasher engineer stacks plate in the dish tray? Sure, the dishes get washed as a group rather than getting individual attention, they still come out clean about 3 minutes later on the other end of the machine. It’s a shame that people 100 years ago built massive bridges, skyscrapers and ocean liners and all we can brag about is a portable phone/tv/radio thingamajig that Dick Tracy already had back in the 50’s. Dutchman must be sorely disappointed in the new crop of engineers. We should be Buck Rogers and Flash by now.