AI is already taking orders at hundreds of Taco Bell restaurants, and there's more to come from the tech.
Soon, for example, it might be able to see how many cars are waiting in the drive-thru and suggest items to shorten the wait time, Joe Park, chief digital and technology officer at Yum! Brands, Taco Bell's parent company, told Business Insider.
Right now, "we just know there's a car at the speaker," Park said. Using AI could allow the store to see that there are five cars in line, which could be useful.
"You might want to suggest selling some quicker-turnover items versus big complex things that might take longer so we can make sure our customers have great speed of service," Park said.
Yum! Brands on Tuesday announced a strategic partnership with Nvidia, the chip firm that has cornered most of the market in AI computing.
While Nvidia has become a top tech player by designing the graphics processing units that power most AI, it has also become important in building software that allows less technical companies to harness it.
Nvidia and Taco Bell have already been testing voice AI for ordering at drive-thrus at some locations. The companies say they're looking at whether AI will be useful elsewhere at Yum! restaurants.
Other fast-food chains have also experimented with AI, especially at their drive-thrus. McDonald's rolled out voice AI to drive-thrus at about 100 restaurants with IBM before ending the pilot last year.
However, some McDonald's customers said that the AI tool got their orders wrong in videos posted on social media. The company then pulled the tech, saying that voice AI "will be part of our restaurants' future."
Wendy's is adding voice AI to hundreds of restaurants this year. The company says that its system's accuracy is improving, and CEO Kirk Tanner said last month that he personally tests it a few times a week.
Yum! plans to roll out voice ordering to about 500 restaurants, including Pizza Hut, Taco Bell, KFC, and Habit Burger and Grill, starting in the second quarter of 2025, Park said.
Still, Andrew Sun, Nvidia's director of global business development for retail, said several things have to go right for AI to equal the experience of ordering from a human. The quality and speed of the AI models can make the difference between a successful and a frustrating conversation with an AI order-taker.
"We've all seen what a poor drive-thru experience could look like when it goes viral in a bad way, and we want to make sure our team members have a great experience," Park said.
Park said Nvidia's approach of providing a speech-recognition model, a ready-made package of software and tools for specific tasks called microservices, and ongoing support should make the difference.
Yet, "you're going to have to build relationships with your customers and your team members to have trust in the system and not shut it off," he said.
He said an off-the-shelf large language model wouldn't be good enough in a scenario where plenty of menu item names are specific to Taco Bell. For example, Park explained that the AI needs to recognize "Limonada" instead of "Lemonade."
Improving voice AI's accuracy will involve "trial and error," Park continued.
"That's such a big unsaid part about AI and getting it to work," he added.
