Your sci-fi dreams have come true at Pizza Hut’s SAFRA Punggol outlet, which welcomed its first humanoid robot employee to work yesterday. So if you’re keen on being the first in Southeast Asia to check out the new tech, swing by the pizza chain from now till Sunday.
During the five-day experiment, the robot will greet diners (in a female voice), assist them with menu choices, and make personalized recommendations. All you have to do is greet it and pair your Masterpass account embedded in the Pizza Hut Singapore app, and the robot will take your verbal orders and process your cashless payment.
The joint venture between Mastercard and Japan-based SoftBank Robotics — the company behind the “Pepper” robot that has been employed in customer service and retail — aims to work towards the evolution of payment processes to offer consumers a smoother experience.
According to Business Insider, the robot took orders seamlessly from Tobias Puehse, vice president of Labs at Mastercard Asia Pacific, in less than three minutes, and even praised him for his “great choice” of menu items.
Unfortunately, others who tried to get their orders in weren’t so successful at getting the robot to recognize their words. Guess you’d really have to enunciate carefully, or you could be waiting quite a while for your food to arrive.
Nevertheless, after the trial period is over, Pizza Hut will take into account feedback from customers to decide if the robot stays or goes. Just don’t go triggering a global robot takeover.
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