March 13th, 2022 - Yesterday, Bots&Pots was opened in Zagreb on Vlaška 50 as the world's first restaurant with robotic chefs capable of preparing all kinds of one-pot meals.

Bots&Pots is a new model of digitized catering, with an ambitious plan of expanding first throughout Croatia and eventually across the world with the help of the franchise business model. The kitchen is run by GammaChef robots that prepare a meal in under 15 minutes all in front of the eyes of the customers. Robots can cook any meal that can be prepared in a pot, hence the name of the restaurant Bots&Pots. They offer Mediterranean-style dishes that include different soups, risottos, stews, seafood pasta, gnocchi, and much more, all for affordable prices. The dishes are designed by a chef Vedran Varvodić and there are also additional employees or as they call them robot operators that prepare the ingredients for robots and serve the customers. After the chef designs a meal the robot makes, a digital recipe and with the help of in-house developed software it can reproduce all the steps with 5 robots restaurant can deliver 60 servings per hour.  

As reported by Jutarnji.hr their current menu includes the following main dishes: daily soups, fuži with chicken and spinach, fuži with shrimps and zucchini, black risotto, octopus goulash, gnocchi on goulash, arrabbiata, chili con carne tortillas, Thai red curry and pumpkin, and mushroom risotto. The prices range from 25 to 65 kuna for the main dishes.

This project was developed by Hrvoje Bujas, Đulijano Nola and Dražen Drnas. Đulijano Nola and Dražen Drnas are the founders of GammaChef a Split based startup that started more than 6 years ago and focused on developing a state-of-the-art smart robotic cooker. As with any startup, these two engineers started in a garage with the aim of combining their two passions engineering and cooking. Their initial idea was to bring a robotic cooker to every household, but they soon realized that the international home appliance market was still not ready for this revolution. As they believed strongly in their idea they embarked on a journey to prove to the business world the contrary. With the help of entrepreneur Hrvoje Bujas, they implemented this technology to develop an innovative restaurant with robotic chefs that is a real game-changer and aims to conquer the world restaurant scene. Hrvoje Bujas and Đulijano Nola already cooperated on several successful projects such as CrnoJaje, Osiguraj.me, and GoHome. 

The whole process is automated from the just-in-time procurement to the preparation of the meal and service in the restaurant. This is a perfect landscape for a franchise model as everything can be standardized and easily scalable. As Bots&Pots stresses their aim is not to rival the restaurants with "fine dining" models but rather fast-food chain giants such as Mcdonald's and KFC.

The time will tell will this Croatian innovative concept manage to stir up the industry with high quality, affordable meals, and fully automated and digitalized restaurants. 

If you want to find out more about Bots&Pots you can check out TCN's previous article on this innovative business model.

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