Zume Pizza
From Invertopedia, the encyclopedia of how things fail
Zume Pizza was a California startup that used robots to make pizzas and baked them in ovens inside delivery trucks, so each pie finished cooking on the way to the customer[2][3]. It raised a reported $445 million, about $375 million of it from SoftBank[1][2], and was valued at more than $1 billion by 2018[1]. Baking on the move never worked well: cheese slid off pizzas on bumps and sharp turns[2]. In 2020 it left pizza for compostable food packaging[1][2], and in June 2023 it was reported to have shut down, allegedly insolvent[1].
Contents
The bet
Robots and data could make pizza delivery cheaper and faster. Robots named Pepe, Marta and Bruno sauced the dough and loaded the ovens at Zume's Mountain View headquarters[3]. A truck carrying 56 GPS-connected ovens on gimbals would start cooking an order as it neared the customer[3], and Zume would use its ordering data to offer pizzas before people asked for them[3].
Pizza was meant to be the start. In 2018 Zume formed an umbrella company, Zume Inc., to sell its truck technology to other restaurants. "Pizza was our prototype," CEO Alex Garden said[5].
What happened
| 2015 | Zume is founded to automate the pizza business.[1][2] |
|---|---|
| Sep 2016 | Zume shows its trucks with 56 ovens and its sauce and oven robots; average delivery time is 22 minutes.[3] |
| Apr 25, 2018 | Zume Inc. is formed to take the truck system beyond pizza.[5] |
| 2018 | SoftBank invests about $375 million, valuing Zume above $1 billion.[1][4] |
| Jun 13, 2019 | Zume buys Pivot, a maker of plant-based packaging, and plans a 70,000-square-foot plant in Southern California.[1][7] |
| Jan 2020 | Zume moves to cut most of its staff. Reports at the time said 80 percent; later accounts say about half.[2][6] |
| 2020 | Zume sells its pizza technology business and turns to sustainable packaging.[1][2] |
| Jun 2023 | Zume is reported to have shut down. It is said to be insolvent and to be selling off its assets instead of filing for bankruptcy.[1][2] |
The kill shot
The core product never worked. Baking in a moving truck kept failing, and instead of fixing it Zume kept changing what it was.
The trucks' ovens let cheese slide off pizzas on bumps and sharp turns[2]. Zume tried parking the trucks in central spots and sending the pies out by car or moped, and that did not fix it[2].
Each new story got bigger: pizza, then a food-truck platform for other restaurants[5], then a packaging company aiming to replace a billion plastic and styrofoam containers[7]. By early 2020 TechCrunch was describing Zume's plans as "robotic pizza cars, or whatever their last idea was"[6].
Red flags ignored
- Physics, not software. A pizza baking in a vehicle has to survive the road, and it didn't.[2]
- A platform before a product. In 2018 Garden called pizza "our prototype" as Zume set out to sell its truck system to other restaurants.[5]
- Money ran ahead of proof. About $375 million from SoftBank went into a company whose cooking method had not been shown to work at scale.[1][2]
- Pivot after pivot. Pizza, then trucks for others, then packaging, inside about five years.[1][5][7]
The cost
A reported $445 million raised[2], though Crunchbase counts $423 million over eight rounds[1]. About $375 million came from SoftBank[1][2]. The 2020 cuts took somewhere between half and 80 percent of staff, depending on the report[2][6]. At the end, Zume was said to be insolvent and liquidating its assets[1].
The inversion
Make the hard part work before you raise for scale. A pivot every year is a hunt for a story, not a product.
What survived
Not much. Zume's packaging line, built on its Pivot acquisition, made compostable containers from materials like bamboo and wheat[2]. When it closed, a firm was hired to sell what was left[2]. Its experience became a warning in food tech: a former food-robotics CEO told Nation's Restaurant News that "the food tech space is inherently hard"[1].
References
- ^ “$400+ million ex-pizza robot company Zume shuts down”. Nation's Restaurant News (Joanna Fantozzi), June 5, 2023. The 2015 founding, about $375 million from SoftBank, Crunchbase's $423 million, the over-$1 billion valuation by 2018, the Pivot deal and plant, the 2020 sale of the pizza business, insolvency and liquidation (per The Information), and the food tech quote.
- ^ “After Raising $445 Million, Zume Pulls the Plug On Its Pizza-Making Robots and Shifts Its Focus to Sustainable Packaging”. Restaurant Technology News (Lea Mira), June 17, 2023. The $445 million and $375 million from SoftBank, the sliding cheese and failed fixes, the 2020 cut of about half the staff, the packaging line, the shutdown and the firm hired to sell assets.
- ^ “Robots and on-board ovens deliver on Zume's promise of better pizza”. TechCrunch (John Mannes), September 1, 2016. Julia Collins as founder, the Mountain View robots, the 56 gimballed ovens, cooking en route, 22-minute deliveries and predictive ordering.
- ^ “Zume”. Wikipedia. Founders Alex Garden and Julia Collins, and the 2018 SoftBank round (cross-check).
- ^ “Zume looks to life beyond pizza”. TechCrunch (Brian Heater), April 25, 2018. Zume Inc. as an umbrella company selling the truck system to restaurants, and Garden's "Pizza was our prototype."
- ^ “As Zume layoffs loom, a look back at SoftBank's troubled investing year”. TechCrunch (Alex Wilhelm), January 7, 2020. The reported plan to shed 80% of staff, the $375 million from the Vision Fund and the "robotic pizza cars" quote.
- ^ “Zume buys packaging company, with eyes on plant-based plastic alternative”. TechCrunch (Brian Heater), June 13, 2019. The Pivot acquisition, the planned plant and the goal of replacing one billion containers.