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Spyce Kitchen

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Boston-based robotic-powered restaurant engineered by MIT grads
Spyce
Restaurant information
Owner(s)Sweetgreen
Head chefDaniel Boulud
Street address241 Washington Street
CityBoston
CountySuffolk
StateMassachusetts
Postal/ZIP Code02201
Coordinates42°21′28″N 71°03′29″W / 42.3579°N 71.0581°W / 42.3579; -71.0581
Websitewww.spyce.com

Spyce Kitchen or just Spyce was a robotic-powered restaurant which prepares food in "three minutes or less".

History

MIT mechanical engineering graduates Michael Farid, Brady Knight, Luke Schlueter and Kale Rogers developed the kitchen using seven autonomous work stations to prepare bowl-based meals using healthy ingredients such as kale, beans and grains. The four graduates wanted to make healthy meals more affordable, so they built the robotic technology and initially served the food to students at an MIT dining hall. The group received the $10,000 "Eat It" Lemelson-MIT undergraduate prize in 2016 as one of America's top two collegiate inventors in food technology.

The four then teamed up with chef Daniel Boulud to create the new menu for their restaurant. Prices started at $7.50 for an entire meal in a bowl at their first real branch, which opened on May 3, 2018, in Boston, Massachusetts. Referred to as the "Spyce Boys", the four founders were inspired by their experiences as hungry student athletes on tight budgets. Spyce Kitchen automated cooking units also clean up after cooking and dirtying the cooking apparatus.

Funding

Spyce raised $21 million in series A funding in September 2018, led by venture capital firms Maveron, Collaborative Fund, and Khosla Ventures.

Restaurants

Spyce operated and then shuttered two restaurants in the Greater Boston area. Their first restaurant was located at 241 Washington St in downtown Boston. Their second restaurant, which opened in February 2021, was located at 1 Brattle Square, in Harvard Square.

Acquisition by Sweetgreen and closure

In 2021, the company was acquired by Sweetgreen, a chain of salad restaurants.

Both Spyce restaurants were closed following the Sweetgreen acquisition, "to focus on developing technology for Sweetgreen restaurants". The downtown Boston location closed October 22, 2021, and the Harvard Square location closed February 18, 2022.

References

  1. ^ "MIT Has Made a Fully Robotic Kitchen". Food & Wine. Retrieved 2018-06-21.
  2. ^ "Xconomy: Spyce, MIT-Born Robotic Kitchen Startup, Launches Restaurant: Video". Xconomy. 2018-05-03. Retrieved 2018-06-21.
  3. Albrecht, Chris (2018-04-11). "Spyce Kitchen Robot Restaurant Opening This Spring". The Spoon. Retrieved 2018-06-21.
  4. ^ "Restaurant keeps its prices down – with a robotic kitchen". newatlas.com. 29 May 2018. Retrieved 2018-06-21.
  5. "Robotic woks are the chefs in this Boston restaurant". Engadget. Retrieved 2018-06-21.
  6. "Go to Downtown Crossing for a Meal Cooked by a Robot". Eater Boston. Retrieved 2018-06-21.
  7. "When a Robot Makes You Dinner". The New Yorker. Retrieved 2018-06-21.
  8. "Collegiate inventors awarded 2016 Lemelson-MIT Student Prize". MIT News. Retrieved 2018-06-21.
  9. "MIT students invented a robotic kitchen that could revolutionize fast food". Business Insider. Retrieved 2018-06-21.
  10. Kolodny, Lora (2018-06-16). "Robots make the food at this Boston restaurant, but the recipes come from vaunted chef Daniel Boulud". CNBC. Retrieved 2018-06-21.
  11. Holley, Peter (2018-05-17). "The Boston restaurant where robots have replaced the chefs". Washington Post. ISSN 0190-8286. Retrieved 2018-06-21.
  12. "In Boston's newest restaurant, all the chefs are robots". Digital Trends. 2018-05-30. Retrieved 2018-06-21.
  13. Muzzi, Madeline. "Watch: Are Grain Bowls Made by Robots the Food of the Future?". Grub Street. Retrieved 2018-06-21.
  14. "Four MIT graduates created a restaurant with a robotic kitchen that cooks your food in three minutes or less". Business Insider. Retrieved 2018-06-21.
  15. Maffei, Lucia (2018-09-07). "MIT-Born Spyce Raises $21M Series A to Open New Robotic Restaurants". BostInno. Retrieved 2018-12-17.
  16. ^ "Spyce | Order Online". order.spyce.com. Retrieved 2021-03-28.
  17. Lucas, Amelia (August 24, 2021). "Salad chain Sweetgreen bets on automation by acquiring Spyce and its robotic kitchen tech". CNBC. Retrieved 2021-10-03.
  18. Heater, Brian (August 25, 2021). "Salad chain Sweetgreen buys kitchen robotics startup Spyce". TechCrunch. Retrieved 2021-10-03.

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