Robotic waiter Yumbo will take and deliver the orders

MK Restaurant is planning to upgrade its hospitality services by deploying robotic waiters in its hotels. Bangkok University, Thailand has kicked into action for devising such robots who will take and dispatch meal orders - under the MK Robot Project”.

yumbo robo waiter

The restaurant is also having plans for using RFID tags that will register a customers likes and dislikes pertaining to meals. In 2009, they executed a CTAsia Robotics project to build 10 meet-and-greet robots called Din Sow, at a cost of 1,000,000 THB ($30,000 USD) each. Rit Thirakomen, Managing Director, MK Restaurant says “We hope to get the robots to do some of the less ‘glamorous’ tasks that typically humans have to do, which tend to be quite repetitive, such as greeting customers with a sawadee ka, this will provide a strong sense of spirit and offer great entertainment.”

However, Din Sow's potential is much limited as it is programmed only for entertaining customers. Yumbo will be their new concept robot which will be enabled to carry trays also. The latest version can store meals on a food tray and assure accident-free transportation. Like Din Sow, the new robot would move and navigate by following lines on the floor. Not only that , Yumbo would also utilize ultrasonic range detection for collision avoidance.

In the meantime, Students of Bangkok University have developed several robot prototypes running on Linux. The actual performance of these robots would be clear only after its implementation. But, the overall outcome is definitely going to boost sales of the international service robotics market.

Via: Plasticpals