Fast food chains bet on automated drive-thrus

McDonald’s set the industry pace after acquiring the conversational AI startup Apprente in 2019 and partnering with IBM to refine the technology. The goal is straightforward: increase order accuracy and push higher-margin upsells without human intervention. By 2022, Checkers and Rally’s had integrated Presto’s chatbot across its corporate-owned drive-thrus, aiming to reallocate staff to more complex kitchen tasks.

Wendy’s took a highly technical approach by collaborating with Google to build "FreshAI." This system was custom-trained on specific franchise jargon, successfully translating customer shorthand like "JBC" into "junior bacon cheeseburger." The company reported that the system finalized orders without human oversight 86 percent of the time during its initial trials in Columbus, Ohio. Taco Bell is now following this trajectory, with plans to deploy voice AI across hundreds of US restaurants by the end of 2024.