July

Oh boy, where do we begin? I believe AI will transform every aspect of the food industry. Imagine a world where every piece of technology leverages AI, enabling seamless communication between systems and moving us closer to truly smart & efficient hospitality spaces. Above all, AI will empower us to become super-humans, with the power of high- performance computing at our fingertips. The key will be to create effective tools and solutions and educating people on how to use AI for their benefit. In addition to what I already listed above, here are some other areas where we will see AI becoming mainstream. You can already dip your feet in some of what I listed below but we will see much more intuitive solutions in the future. 3. Future applications of generative AI in the industry:

Virtual Reality Dining Experiences Voice-Activated Ordering Systems Custom Beverage Formulations Food Safety Monitoring AI-Driven Training Programs

Since we saw each other at the SHFM conference, the launch of ChatGPT-4o has been announced. The advancements in conversational and vision capabilities will accelerate developments that we thought would take decades. Now, all the camera footage that was previously underutilized can be elaborated upon as analytics. AI can see something and automatically alert you, which is a revolutionary concept. Imagine what this means for compliance, safety, and accessibility. Applications for spatial awareness will be taken to a whole new level. Companies have been storing vast amounts of documents and other unstructured data for years without a practical way to analyze it. Now, imagine PDF documents, PowerPoint presentations, Word documents, and Excel files all becoming interactive and insightful. Large language models (LLMs) can convert these policies, manuals, and training materials into a co-pilot that you can access with a simple prompt. Speaking of prompts, that concept will feel outdated soon. “That was so May 2024 😊 ” We'll be conversing with our AI concierges to get whatever information we need, seamlessly and intuitively. 4. Trust in DoorDash vs. local restaurant apps: When I mentioned the trust people have in the DoorDash app compared to a local restaurant's app, I was referring specifically to the Business and Industry (B&I) environment. Host companies often have privacy and data security concerns when contract food service companies introduce their own apps, unlike their comfort with widely accepted apps like DoorDash or Uber Eats. If a contract food service company offers a DoorDash white-label app, clients are likely to embrace it. Additionally, contract food service apps often don't match the quality and user experience of apps like DoorDash, Uber Eats, Starbucks, or Panera Bread. To gain client support, these companies need to improve their app quality to offer a similar user experience and demonstrate robust privacy and security compliance. This would enable them to collect user information for personalized experiences.

Personalized Menu Creation Automated Recipe Development Dynamic Pricing Models

Smart Inventory Management Interactive Culinary Assistants AI-Powered Nutrition Analysis Advanced Customer Feedback Analysis Predictive Maintenance for Kitchen Equipment Enhanced Customer Service Bots Automated Food Photography and Marketing Content

HOSPITALITY NEWS JULY | Page 49