These robots are changing cooking forever. But one thing will never change

The robotics ecosystem in Japan is amazing. And confusing.

It's a collection of crazy ideas, odd creations, and true breakthroughs. And despite the combination of fawning prise and snide skepticism that Japanese robotics evoke in the international press, only time can really separate the true breakthroughs from the dead ends.

Today, we sit down with Tez Sawanobori, the founder of Connected Robotics, and we talk about how robots are being adopted in the restaurant industry here in Japan.

Connected Robotics already has two lines of consumer-visible robots being used in restaurants in Japan, and the reaction from the owners, the employees, and the customers has been overwhelmingly positive and quite a bit different than similar experiments run in America.

We talk about the strong economic and social pressures affecting the adoption of robots in restaurants and discuss the changes he had to make before chefs and robots can really work side by side.

It's a great conversation, and I think you will really enjoy it.


Show Notes

The real reason we need robots chefs
The unlikely founding of Connected Robotics
Why the restaurant business is so hard to disrupt
Looking at the real economics of food prep robots
What’s holding back robotics in restaurants
Can robotics really solve the labor shortage in Japan?
How Japanese employment practices make it harder to use robots but increase the need for them
How Japan can catch up to the US and China in robotics research
The best way for American and Japanese robotics engineers to work together
The future of foreign workers in Japan


Links from the Founder

Everything you wanted to know about Connected Robotics
Watch a video of the OctoChef in action
Follow Tez on Twitter @tezsawa
Friend him on Facebook
Connect on LinkedIn

Leave a comment
Transcript
Welcome to Disrupting Japan, straight talk from Japan’s most successful entrepreneurs.

I’m Tim Romero and thanks for joining me.

Today, we’re going to be talking about the OctoChef.

“What the hell is the OctoChef?” you might ask, and that would be a good and quite reasonable question.

The OctoChef was created by Connected Robotics and it’s a robot that makes Takoyaki, and we’re going to sit down with founder Tez Sawanobori and talk about why it’s important.

It’s important to understand that the OctoChef is not just some crazy side project of Tez and the team, although I guess it was the very first time I met them, but no, now, the OctoChef is being used in both small scale, single restaurant installations and industrial scale factory installations.

Tez and I talk in detail about how Japanese react to robotics and work with robots very differently than westerners do. We also sit down and eat some pretty good robot-cooked Takoyaki and take a hard look at the question of whether the OctoChef is just a novelty or a fad, or if on the other hand, it’s solving a real problem.

The answer turns out to be yes but the reason why is pretty surprising.

But you know, Tez tells that story much better than I can, so let’s get right to the interview.

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Interview
Tim: So, I’m sitting here with Tez Sawanobori from Connected Robotics, the maker of the OctoChef, so thanks for sitting down with me.

Tez: Yeah, thank you for having me in this great show.

Tim: Thank you. What is the OctoChef?

Tez: OctoChef cooks Takoyaki. Takoyaki is octopus ball popular in Japanese festivals, you see a lot of Takoyaki stalls.

Tim: Yeah, the round little – and they’re awesome, it’s great food.

Tez: Yeah, yeah, it’s a popular Japanese fast food, and a robot cooks Takoyaki and it’s from pouring oil to serving to the dish, all the process the robots do.

Tim: Okay, so in the process, the humans still have to create the batter?

Tez: Yes.

Tim: And, I guess deliver the cooked Takoyaki to the cus...