Robots as professional Chefs - Nikhil Abraham, CloudChef
Jul 20, 2025 · 18:58
Nikhil Abraham, CEO of CloudChef, explains how his company turned a general-purpose bimanual robot into a professional chef that works in commercial kitchens for $12 an hour. The robot learns new recipes from a single expert demonstration, using thermal and visual embeddings to handle ingredient and appliance variation. CloudChef's system achieves 95% autonomy and outperforms expert human chefs in cooking decision-making, as evaluated on over 1,000 recipes. The robot is deployed in restaurants like Wingstar and Elan, cooking real meals at 80–95% human speed. Abraham notes that the platform can operate 168 hours a week and aims to expand to tasks like chopping.
