2b AHEAD Ventures is an incubator and company builder. It was founded by Sven Gábor Jánszky and his future institute ''2b AHEAD ThinkTank''. 2b AHEAD Ventures is based in the former Baumwollspinnerei in Leipzig-Plagwitz, where the 2b AHEAD parent institute has developed into Europe's largest independent future research institute. The main difference between 2b AHEAD Ventures and the other start-up incubators in the region? The strict focus on global business models and the direct link to Silicon Valley. They do not finance already existing start-up teams, but they take the concepts for disruptive business model innovations, which the 2b AHEAD Institute develops for its customers anyway, and which in their opinion have the potential to profoundly change industries. They build up their own teams of founders around these ideas and accompany them on their way.

2b AHEAD Ventures

DaVinci Kitchen

The first robotic chef in the world that creates high class organic pasta dishes in under 3 minutes without human interaction.

DaVinci Kitchen manufactures a fully automated robotic chef kiosk that can prepare organic pasta dishes in three minutes. The robot can customize dishes using 10 ingredients and five sauces, making 40 meals per hour. Customers can place orders via its app, upon which the robot would start preparing the meal using its articulating arm. The first test run was held successfully in January 2020 and then deployed as a lunch station at Apetito AG (a frozen food company), an investor in the startup.

Helping restaurants become more safe, more profitable, and more interesting.

Restaurant Industry Robotics

DaVinci Kitchen manufactures a fully automated robotic chef kiosk that can prepare organic pasta dishes in three minutes. The robot can customize dishes using 10 ingredients and five sauces, making 40 meals per hour. Customers can place orders via its app, upon which the robot would start preparing the meal using its articulating arm. The first test run was held successfully in January 2020 and then deployed as a lunch station at Apetito AG (a frozen food company), an investor in the startup.In July 2021, DaVinci Kitchen raised more than EUR 500,000 (around USD 591,000) through an equity crowdfunding campaign. The company intends to utilize the new funds to finalize its pre-production version kiosk. At the time, it also announced plans to open a trial restaurant in Leipzig, Germany.

<div>
 
 Dexai Robotics developed a robotic arm known as “Alfred” that works as a flexible food-preparation assistant using artificial intelligence and computer vision technologies. Alfred is a plug-and-play solution for restaurants and can be used to prepare salads and food bowls, without any alteration to restaurants’ layouts or recipes. The robot debuted in the 2019 Web Summit in Portugal, serving  2,500+ attendees over the course of two days. The company offers its services on a robotics-as-a-service (RaaS) basis, where customers are charged a flat fee for dishes the robot prepares.
 
 
 Key customers and partnerships
 
 
 The company has partnerships with the Defense Logistics Agency (DLA) to install the robots at 10 military locations across the US 
 <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/8680">
 (February 2022)
 </a>
 and with Boston-based Mediterranean restaurant Bonapita to deploy its robot to prepare salads and other food bowls at the latter’s restaurant 
 <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/10059">
 (April 2022).
 </a>
 
 
 Funding and financials
 
 
 In August 2022, Dexai Robotics 
 <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/12258">
 raised USD 6.7 million
 </a>
 in funding. Previously in March 2020, it raised USD 5.5 million in a seed funding round led by Hyperplane Venture Capita to expand its engineering, sales, and product teams.
 
</div>

Dexai Robotics

Miso Robotics offers a range of kitchen automation solutions and a software platform that powers its robots (the latter as a standalone service). The company’s latest product line includes&nbsp;<ol><li>Flippy 2,&nbsp;&nbsp;a burger flipping robot that can load, fry, and place the items in a hot holding area without assistance and can handle up to 60 baskets per hour. This is the latest version of the original Flippy introduced in 2018.</li><li>Flippy Wings, a robotic chicken wing frying solution that can identify the food using AI vision technology, to pick up the food, cook, and drop into a hot holding area. Both the models are equipped with its “AutoBin” system—an array of customizable food-safe bins into which the food is dropped to be cooked.&nbsp;</li><li>Flippy Lite which focuses on a single product that needs seasoning and finishing.</li><li>Sippy,&nbsp;a beverage dispensing robot developed in partnership with beverage dispensers manufacturer Lancer Worldwide. Sippy is equipped with a fully-automated conveyor system to dispense drinks. Sippy directly integrates with a point-of-sale system, which triggers the beverage-making process including selecting the appropriate sized cup and pouring and sealing the drink while ensuring appropriate delivery of orders.&nbsp;</li><li>CookRight, an AI and machine learning-driven cooking platform that includes a user interface tablet, two cameras, and a small computer. CookRight focuses on grill-based cooking and is capable of tracking food items on a grill for precision-level cooking and sends alerts to kitchen staff when an action is needed. The platform is also capable of managing the food serving workflow to ensure freshness and correct assembly of orders. Miso Robotics also launched “CookRight Coffee,” a coffee monitoring system powered by the platform in&nbsp;<a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/9725">April 2022.</a></li></ol>As of April 2022, the company had commercialized its Flippy 2 robots, while Flippy Wings, Flippy Lite, and Sippy were available for reservation. Its products are available on a robotics-as-a-service (RaaS) basis—Flippy and Flippy 2 Wings are offered to customers starting at USD 3,000 per month (fees related to other products were not made available as of April 2022). The CookRight platform is offered as a standalone software-as-a-service (SaaS) offering for restaurants at a monthly subscription of USD 100.Key customers and partnershipsMiso Robotics’ customer partnerships include&nbsp;<a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/8509">White Castle</a>,&nbsp;<a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/9156">Chipotle Mexican Grill restaurants</a>,&nbsp;<a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/6135">Inspire Brands</a>,&nbsp;<a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/9725">Panera Bread,</a>&nbsp;<a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/9940">Jack in the Box,</a>&nbsp;<a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/10692">Wing Zone,</a>&nbsp; <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/11139">Americana Restaurants,</a> and&nbsp;<a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/11567">Wings and Rings.</a> In&nbsp;<a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/25118">December 2023</a>, Miso Robotics partnered with restaurant technology company Cali Group and PopID, a developer of identity verification solutions, to launch an automated restaurant named CaliExpress in Pasadena, California.&nbsp;The company also has a June 202&nbsp;<a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/10929">partnership with Amazon Web Services</a> (AWS) to test its software powering Flippy 2 and Flippy Lite at scale, using AWS RoboMaker, a cloud-based simulation service and an&nbsp;<a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/35619">October 2024</a> partnership with NVIDIA to integrate accelerated computing and robotics technologies into its next-generation Flippy Fry Stations.

Miso Robotics

MiFood designs and manufactures a fully automated robotic chef for restaurants that can prepare burgers and hotdogs. The company has offices in Spain, Poland, and the US.

MiFood

Endurance is a Russian-American technology startup offering robots, lasers, and chatbots. Under its robotics solutions, it provides customer-based robotics systems such as telepresence systems, robot waiters, and truckbots.

Endurance

<div>
 
 Blendid (also known as 6d bytes) offers a smoothie-making robotic kiosk that uses machine learning and computer vision to blend fruit drinks. The system is a plug-and-play solution that can be set up on-site in food-service operations. The kiosk comes with a robotic arm, blenders, refrigerators, and dispensers to store and dispense ingredients. It can produce up to 45 drinks per hour and nine drinks simultaneously. Customers can place orders via its mobile app or Blendid tablets, and the robot generally prepares the drink in under two minutes for a price of USD 5&ndash;USD 6 (for a 12-ounce drink). Blendid&rsquo;s kiosks operate at universities, retail outlets such as 
 <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/2529">
 Walmart,
 </a>
 and at juice maker Jamba&rsquo;s co-branded locations including Walmart stores, a shopping mall, a university,
 a 
 <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/15502">
 hospital
 </a>
 and 
 <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/11829">
 Love&rsquo;s Travel Stop locations
 </a>
 in California, as well as 
 <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/8519">
 two universities in Georgia.
 </a>
 
 
 As per the company, it has generated USD 149,624 in total revenue since inception, with USD 64,449 generated in FY2020 (ending October 31st). However, annual net losses have been in the USD 3-USD 4 million range during FY2018-FY2020. Salary and benefits accounted for around half of total operating expenses in FY2020, while non-payroll research and development&rsquo;s (R&amp;D&rsquo;s) share of operating expenses had declined to less than 20% from almost 50% in 2018. As of October 31st, 2020, the company had USD 2.1 million in cash on hand and an average quarterly burn rate of USD 910,000
 <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/5410">
 .
 </a>
 
 
 <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/5410">
 In September 2021,
 </a>
 Blendid raised USD 2 million through equity crowdfunding at a valuation of almost USD 50 million. The company intended to utilize the funds to fast track its geographical expansion into Southern California and Georgia by opening in a range of locations including malls, airports, hospitals, universities, and retail outlets.
 
</div>

Blendid

Robotic solutions for restaurant services such as waiting tables, bussing tables, dishwashing, kitchen preparation, food quality check, and staff training.

Robots that pick, place, slice, and butcher fruits, vegetables, meats and other food products. Also includes companies that develop robots for picking, placement, and dispensing of processed foods (ex: cake decorating).

Robotic solutions for pizza, burger and hotdog preparation.

Robotic solutions for salad and food bowl (pasta, ramen etc) preparation.

Robotic solutions for coffee, tea, soda, and smoothie preparation.

The majority of companies in the industry use robotics technology

Some companies in the industry uses AI and ML-based robotic solutions

DaVinci Kitchen

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