Recently the InOrbit team was excited to host another in our series of fascinating webinars; this time on the state of automation in foodservice and the implications of robotics for the FoodTech space at large. As with the previous InOrbit webinars, CEO Florian Pestoni hosted a discussion with some great guest speakers bringing their insights and expertise to bear.

If you didn’t have a chance to join us the webinar is now available for free on-demand. Although you might first want to read on and explore some of our key takeaways from the discussion.

InOrbit is on a mission to maximize the potential of every robot. To do that, we educate and advocate for the adoption of effective robot operations (RobOps) and work to fulfill our promise of bringing DevOps best practices to robotics. Today we’re continuing that work, with the launch of new support for Configuration as Code.

This is a vital DevOps practice that has allowed massive data centers and cloud applications to scale. The configuration of every computing resource can be handled through code, such as scripts and API calls, enabling greater control and more advanced logic. This can then be managed through version control systems such as git, support rollbacks and more granular configuration based on different variables.  

At InOrbit, most of our time is spent thinking about robots and how to make them perform better. But part of that vision includes robots and humans working together – without the human factor, robots are just a collection of metal and plastic parts. Here is another in a series of posts highlighting some of the outstanding humans on the InOrbit team, also known as InOrbiters. The posts aim to share details on some members of the team, what drove them to work here, and what they find most interesting about robotics and the development of the InOrbit platform.

Today we sat down with Christopher Yao. Chris is a Sales Development Representative at InOrbit and works closely with sales, marketing, and the customer success teams. He lives in Mountain View, California, and has been with InOrbit for just over two years.

In the Star Wars universe, there is a light side and a dark side (also, just like duct tape). This duality can be represented in almost any area of technology – things designed to be good for humanity can also be turned bad by different people. Time and again, we’ve seen cyberattacks, security breaches and shutdowns caused by people exploiting systems that were designed initially to help people.

The Internet was built with a promise of unlimited information available at everyone’s fingertips, a truly egalitarian and noble concept. But along with the good it continues to provide, the Internet spawned dangers such as the dark web, spam, phishing, fake news and disinformation that spreads via social media and other sites.

Much has been written about the impact of automation. Since the beginning of the Industrial Revolution, when Luddites destroyed textile machinery to protest new technology that impacted traditional practices, there have been fears of humans being replaced by machines.

The reality is more complex. Automation has definitely affected certain professions and tasks, impacting people to a greater or lesser degree (when was the last time you rode in an elevator with a human operator?). This has resulted in workforce disruptions; however, the overall volume of work continues to grow, creating even more opportunities. Many people now wonder what the impact of automation will be over the next 15 years.

Despite a litany of forces working against them, American consumers spent a record amount of money during the 2021 holiday season. Shaking off supply chain woes, inflation concerns and a surge in Covid cases like a Taylor Swift song, consumers not only returned to physical stores but continued to shop online for their holiday gifts.

Last year I participated in the A3 conference on Autonomous Mobile Robots & Logistics, in Memphis. The location was no coincidence: Memphis is the global headquarters for FedEx, one of the largest logistics companies, with operations around the world. A highlight for me was being on stage with luminaries in the robotics space, including FedEx’s Aaron Prather.

The relationship of technology and food production and distribution has a longer history than most people realize. Early man used sticks and stones to shovel dirt as subsistence farming was invented. The first plows made their appearance as early as 4,000 BCE, and Mendel famously applied scientific rigor alongside engineering as his experiments cross-breeding peas led him to be widely considered the “father of modern genetics”.

The process of producing food and bringing it to the table is an ever-evolving exercise. The introduction of automation into agriculture, and related areas of food technology, or FoodTech, are poised to revolutionize these fields again. FoodTech is a broad category of initiatives designed to help feed the explosive growth in our global population, to manage waste, to address food scarcity, support a troubled supply chain, and revolutionize food service to tackle labor challenges. Investors in FoodTech want to see technologies applied that will strengthen everything from production to distribution to consumption. With such an expansive scope, much of the FoodTech innovation often focuses very pointedly on solutions for specific yet complex issues. 

It’s the start of a new year, and it’s customary to look at the year ahead. In addition, February 1st will mark the start of The Year of the Tiger in the Lunar calendar. 

Over here at InOrbit, we believe that it will also be The Year of the Robot. As companies across industries become more comfortable with the use of autonomous robots to augment their workforce, growth in robotics deployments is accelerating.

As the days of 2021 come to a close, we quickly anticipate the new year and all of our exciting new projects atInOrbit. But before we flip the calendar, let’s take a look at the trends we predicted back in January to see how we did. Was our crystal ball clear or cloudy?