Home > Business > Industry

GS25's fried chicken to get a robot's touch

Published: 23 Feb. 2022, 15:56

Robo Arete's chicken-frying robot, which will be used at one GS25 branch starting in April. [GS RETAIL]

A robot will be cooking fried chicken at a GS25 branch in April.

GS Retail, which runs convenience store chain GS25, announced Wednesday it signed a memorandum of understanding with robot start-up Robo Arete.

One of Robo Arete’s chicken-frying robots will be installed in one of GS25’s branches in April.

Robo Arete is a start-up founded in 2018. It developed a chicken-frying robot for use in its Robert Chicken chain, which has six branches, all take-out and all owned by the company. Cooking is done by robots, but humans take orders and package the food for deliveries.

GS25 has been offering fried chicken and nuggets for years and humans have had to do all the frying of the frozen chicken pieces. GS Retail says robots can take some of that greasy work off their hands.

After the first robot gets to work in April, GS Retail will get feedback from the branch owner and its part-time workers to evaluate its efficiency. It didn't identify which branch would be the first.

Assuming the feedback is positive, more robots will be sent to more branches.

“By introducing the chicken-frying robot, we plan to efficiently operate our branches, make cooking more safe and provide food with a consistent quality,” said Kwon Young-hwan, head of GS Retail's food division.

“In today's rapidly developing era of automation, the robot is just one of the first types of smart systems we plan to use in our convenience stores.”

BY LEE TAE-HEE [[email protected]]