Fukushima Burger Joint Tests Robot Serving French Fries

A Tokyo-based company noted for developing soba robots introduced at train stations in the capital region has begun testing a robotic arm that makes fries at a burger restaurant in Minamisoma, Fukushima, Shuji Ozaki reported for Mainichi Japan.

Photo Insert: The burger store is supposedly the first one in Japan where humans and robots work together.

Until February 2022, people in Minamisoma, Fukushima Prefecture, will be able to try the fries -- served up by the robot developed at Connected Robotics Inc. -- and burgers for free.

The company, which began testing the robot Nov. 4, aims to have the robot in use at outlets next year, and it is also eyeing development of a burger maker. It claims the burger store is the first one in Japan where humans and robots work together.

The new store is run by takeout burger store Bexburger, which started out in Tokyo's Kichijoji neighborhood. It was set up inside a container-like structure built in the parking lot of a Minamisoma shopping mall.

There, behind the three employees making burgers and bagging fries, the robot operates quietly. It takes baskets of fries filled by human workers and plunges them into the fryer.

After occasionally shaking the basket to loosen the fries, it finishes deep frying them, lifts the basket, drains it of oil, and transfers it to the bagging station -- a platform equipped with a warmer. It can produce up to 120 servings an hour, the equivalent of a half to a full worker's labor.

Bexburger sees its Minamisoma outpost as a "lab store," and it is offering residents free meals based on a reservation system while it continues to review taste, quality, and how the machine works with humans, among other issues.

The Fukushima Prefecture outlet makes use of subsidies provided in connection with the Innovation Coast Framework, which aims to advance new industries on the coast of Fukushima Prefecture as part of recovery efforts following the March 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake.

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