US-based quick service restaurant (QSR) company Yum! Brands has partnered with NVIDIA to expedite the development of AI technologies for its restaurants worldwide.
Yum! Brands is the parent company of restaurant chains KFC, Taco Bell, Pizza Hut and Habit Burger & Grill. It has more than 61,000 locations and is the first AI restaurant partner of NVIDIA.
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Yum! and NVIDIA aim to transform dining by deploying scaleable and cost-effective AI applications.
The technology will enhance Yum!’s Byte by Yum! platform, launched in February 2025.
The partnership will leverage NVIDIA NIM microservices for the optimisation of operations and improving efficiency and enhancing experiences for both team members and customers.
NIM microservices are part of NVIDIA AI Enterprise on Amazon Web Services (AWS).
Byte by Yum! president and Yum! Brands chief digital and technology officer Joe Park stated: “This partnership will enable us to harness the rich consumer and operational data sets on our Byte by Yum! integrated platform to build smarter AI engines that will create easier experiences for our customers and team members.”
The AI solutions are set to revolutionise three critical areas within Yum! Brands.
Voice-automated order-taking AI agents will improve drive-through and call centre operations, while computer vision will enhance drive-through efficiency and back-of-house operations.
AI-driven analytics will assess restaurant performance, providing managers with personalised action plans based on top-performing locations.
Yum! Brands is piloting AI solutions at select Taco Bell and Pizza Hut locations in the US using NVIDIA technology.
A broader rollout to 500 restaurants across Taco Bell, Pizza Hut, KFC and Habit Burger is planned for the second quarter (Q2) of 2025.
NVIDIA Retail, consumer packaged goods and QSR business development global director of retail Andrew Sun stated: “NVIDIA’s software makes it affordable for even the largest restaurant company to improve operations and customer experiences, proving AI can pay off at every location.
“Working with Yum! Brands’ best-in-class digital and technology team and proprietary Byte by Yum! platform to integrate NVIDIA AI software breaks barriers to AI innovation in the restaurant industry – delivering real-time, context-aware intelligence, powered by a scaleable inference platform.”
