Serving robots have become an attractive option for restaurants in China as recruitment of waiters has become increasingly difficult.
Two years ago, Bao Xiangyi dropped out of school and waited in a restaurant for half a year to support himself, and the 19-year-old recalled that time in a difficult and obsessive way.
“It’s crazy to work in a number of Chinese restaurants. The number of my daily steps WeChat measured reached 20,000 steps in just one day, just taking food inside the restaurant alone.” , Bao said.
And this made him quit the waiter job and decided to go back to school, he is now a university in Hangzhou, Zhejiang province.
Serving robots developed by Pudu Tech, a startup in Shenzhen, have been adopted by thousands of restaurants in China, as well as several other countries including Singapore, South Korea and Germany.
“I cannot accept that 365 days a year would be like that,” Bao said. “Those days were filled with darkness and I felt like my whole life would forever be a lowly and mediocre servant.”
Olivia Niu, a 23-year-old Hong Kong resident, is also a good example. She quit the waitress job right after the first day of work. “During the peak hours, the work will be very busy, even though I am very hungry, but I still have to try to prepare meals for customers,” Niu said.
The service robot was developed by Pudu Tech, a three-year startup in Shenzhen
Becoming a waiter has never been a top career choice but it is still a great source of employment in China. Yang Chunyan, a waitress at Lanlifang Hotel in Wenzhou, southeast China, had two children and said she chose this job because she needed to make a living.
The young generation of China today has a bigger vision and understands more of the field. Among those born after 2000, 24.5% wanted a career related to literature and the arts. Next is education and IT industry in second and third place, according to aggregated information from Tencent QQ and China Youth Daily.
This makes it difficult for Chinese executives to recruit qualified staff, and even if so, very few people can withstand the daily pressure of hundreds of food orders. , so the best option is probably robots.