Author Archives: AccountMate

Hello Robot Restaurant

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September 14, 2015

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There’s a new quinoa restaurant in San Francisco, one where customers order, pay and receive their food and never interact with a person, writes The New York Times (Sept. 9, 2015). The restaurant, Eatsa, the first outlet in a company with national ambitions, is almost fully automated. There are no waiters or even an order taker behind a counter. There is no counter. There are unseen people helping to prepare the food, but there are plans to fully automate that process, too, if it can be done less expensively than employing people. Whether a restaurant that employs few people is good for the economy is another question. Restaurants have traditionally been a place where low-skilled workers can find employment. Continue reading →

Chinese Manufacturers Head for South Carolina

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August 6, 2015

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Ni Meijuan (center) at Keer's S.C. factory

Twenty-five years ago, Ni Meijuan earned $19 a month working the spinning machines at a vast textile factory in China. Now at the Keer Group’s cotton mill in South Carolina, Ni is training American workers to do the job she used to do. “They’re quick learners,” she said. “But they have to learn to be quicker.”

Once the epitome of cheap mass manufacturing, textile producers from formerly low-cost nations are starting to set up shop in America, reports The New York Times (Aug. 3, 2015). It is part of a blurring between high- and low-cost manufacturing nations that few would have predicted a decade ago. Textile production in China is becoming increasingly unprofitable after years of rising wages, higher energy bills, and mounting logistical costs.

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The Dinosaur says, “If You Want to Check In, Press One.” Welcome to The Henn na – or Weird Hotel.

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July 22, 2015

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Wierd Hotel JapanThe English-speaking receptionist is a vicious-looking dinosaur, and the one speaking Japanese is a female humanoid, writes The Guardian (July 15, 2015). “If you want to check in, push one,” the dinosaur says. The visitor punches a button on the desk, and types in information on a touch panel screen. From the front desk to the porter that’s an automated trolley taking luggage up to the room, the Henn na Hotel in southwestern Japan, is manned almost totally by robots to save labor costs. The hotel uses facial recognition technology, instead of the standard electronic keys, to register the digital image of the guest’s face during check-in. The reason? Robots aren’t good at finding keys if people happen to lose them.

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