IBM buys technology labs from McDonald's

Big Blue has taken a bite out of McDonald's, acquiring the burger chain's automated order taking (AOT) tech – and the "McD Tech Labs" that built it, for an undisclosed consideration that may or may not include an upsold serve of fries. The labs were created after Mickey Dee's 2019 acquisition of AI voice recognition startup Apprente – a deal touted as giving the burger-slinger the special sauce needed to build voice recognition tech into mobile ordering services or McKiosks. McDonald's told investors its efforts to cook Apprente's tech into something tasty have "shown substantial benefits to customers and restaurant crew experience". Once Big Blue bites into Big Mac's AI, McDonald's thinks the tech will really start to sizzle. "Moving forward, IBM's expertise in building customer care solutions with AI and natural language processing will help scale the AOT technology across markets and tackle integrations including additional languages, dialects and menu variations," reads the joint IBM/McDonald's McStatement.