In 2021, McDonald’s and IBM announced a partnership to develop Automated Order Taking (AOT) technology as part of McDonald’s “Accelerating the Arches” growth plan, aiming to streamline and enhance the ordering experience for customers and staff. IBM highlighted that their AOT technology, born from this collaboration, is among the most advanced in the industry, being both fast and accurate even under challenging conditions.

Despite McDonald’s ongoing evaluation and refinement of its AOT plans, IBM expressed eagerness to continue collaborating on various other projects. McDonald’s emphasized that this is not the end of their AI endeavors, with plans to assess scalable voice-ordering solutions by the end of 2024.

David Henkes, senior principal and head of strategic partnerships at Technomic, remarked that while AI will play a significant role in future restaurant automation and efficiency, the technology is still in its early stages. McDonald’s commitment to AI demonstrates its potential benefits and current limitations.

McDonald’s isn’t alone in exploring AI; White Castle tested an automated drive-thru system in 2021, and Wendy’s expanded its collaboration with Google Cloud to introduce its own AI ordering tool in May of the previous year. Despite the enthusiasm, the implementation of AI in fast-food operations has encountered issues, such as the technology struggling with accents and differentiating voices from background noise, leading to incorrect orders.

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