Food Delivery Robots Help Transform Smart Catering

Food delivery robots refer to intelligent commercial service robots that can replace restaurant waiters in food delivery, order return and reception. Since the epidemic in 2020, people's demand for food delivery robots has been increasing, and market recognition is also rising. my country's food delivery robot industry may enter a period of rapid outbreak growth. According to data from the National Bureau of Statistics, China's industrial robot output in 2019 was 186,943 sets, a year-on-year increase of 26.6%; in 2020, China's industrial robot output was 237,068 sets, a year-on-year increase of 26.8%; in 2021, China's industrial robot output reached 366,000 units, A year-on-year increase of 67.9%; revenue exceeded 80 billion yuan, an increase of nearly 30% year-on-year.

The food delivery robot is equipped with core hardware such as chips, controllers, reducers, and driving devices. It has functions including automatic food delivery, autonomous charging, autonomous navigation, and autonomous obstacle avoidance. It integrates mobile robots, multi-sensor information fusion and navigation and Multimodal man-machine exchange and other technologies. According to different moving methods, it can be divided into tracked food delivery robots and trackless food delivery robots. Among them, the tracked food delivery robot has a fixed track and cannot move the robot at will. The magnetic navigation technology and RFID positioning technology are used to realize the food delivery of the robot at a fixed position; A robot refers to a robot that has no fixed track and can move at will. UWB technology and fully autonomous navigation and positioning technology are used to realize the omnidirectional movement of the robot.

Food delivery robots can replace or partially replace restaurant waiters to serve customers, which can not only improve the efficiency of catering, but also reduce labor costs. However, some technical bottlenecks also appeared in the promotion process of food delivery robots, which hindered the expansion of its application scenarios to a certain extent, including the deviation of the tracking path during the food delivery process, and the lack of intelligent human-computer interaction functions. Among them are the following Two more common problems:

Path stability during the tracking process The food delivery robot's traveling process relies on the tracking system for navigation. Through the tracking system, the food delivery robot can walk to the target position autonomously. Among many tracking technologies, magnetic navigation technology is usually used. Since the magnetic detection sensor is restricted by hardware performance, tracking module algorithm, and response speed of the drive system, the process of tracking the food delivery robot along the ground usually has deviations. The time to correct the position deviation determines the stability of the food delivery robot. If the time is too long, it will cause the moving process to shake left and right. When the robot travels at a high speed, unnecessary deceleration may also occur, making the actual route of travel deviate from the predetermined trajectory.

Reliability of Obstacle Recognition Since the travel route of the food delivery robot is generally a preset route, fixed obstacles such as tables, chairs and walls in the restaurant have been avoided in the preset setting, and the main obstacles that the food delivery robot needs to identify are those for dining Movable obstacles such as customers and luggage. These obstacles have the characteristics of unstable positions, different shapes, and various materials. Because of the personal safety of customers, it is particularly important to accurately identify these obstacles. Generally, the identification technology of obstacles includes infrared sensing technology and ultrasonic sensing technology. The former cannot identify translucent objects and has poor detection effect on objects with a color close to black; the latter is not limited by the color of the object, but has shortcomings such as slow response speed . In order to ensure efficient and reliable obstacle detection, the fusion obstacle avoidance technology combining infrared sensors and ultrasonic sensors can be adopted, so that the food delivery robot can quickly respond to emergencies and send signals to the main control module in time, which will take the measures such as slowing down or stopping.

The epidemic has reshaped people's consumption habits. From the use of mobile phone online ordering, group meal cash registers, and unmanned self-service ordering machines in the ordering and settlement process, to contactless meal delivery and smart food delivery robots in the takeaway delivery process. Seeing the figure of catering intelligent hardware, with the continuous advancement of technology, the application of food delivery robots will gradually usher in a climax, and I believe that the development prospects of food delivery robots in the future will definitely be brighter.