An in-vehicle AI trial that was first introduced by McDonald’s two years ago in partnership with IBM will soon come to an end, Restaurant Business has confirmed. News of McDonald’s canceling the trial was shared with franchisees in an email sent last week.
“While there have been successes to date, we believe there is an opportunity to explore voice ordering solutions more broadly,” Mason Smoot, director of restaurants at McDonald’s USA, said in the email. “After careful review, McDonald’s has decided to end our current partnership with IBM on AOT and the technology will be turned off in all restaurants currently testing it no later than July 26, 2024.”
The technology, which was tested in more than 100 McDonald’s locations, worked by using Artificial Intelligence to take customer orders. Although it seemed like a simple enough concept, it quickly turned chaotic last year at some drive-thru.
The chaos was captured in several hilariously unhinged viral TikToks. In one video, a woman says the drive-thru display added nine sweet teas to her order when all she asked for was to have a Diet Coke incorrectly added to her order removed.
In another TikTok, a woman can be heard yelling at the drive-thru screen to “stop” as she adds hundreds of dollars worth of McNuggets Meals to her order. The chaos intensifies with the sound of her friend laughing uncontrollably in the background.
Despite these AI setbacks, McDonald’s revealed that it “will have made an informed decision on a future voice ordering solution by the end of the year.” This suggests that the restaurant is not completely closing the door on its AI self-service programs, despite all of these issues.
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