Editor’s Note: This article was originally published in Franchise Times, a sister publication to Food On Demand.
While restaurants have enhanced their technology for front-of-house operations, leaders at digital developer Qu feel more needs to be done in the kitchen.
To improve operations behind the scenes, the company is rolling out a new platform, Smart Kitchen, to assist brands with what Qu CEO Amir Hudda called “the heart of a restaurant.”
“The smarter you can make the kitchen, the better it is for your top and bottom lines,” Hudda said. “We know the challenges that franchisees and franchisors have in this environment where food and labor costs are high. If we can help them save on energy and improve orders, it’s good for sustainability and for their business.”
The new platform includes technology able to optimize energy used by equipment in the kitchen, alert staff to issues, predict needed maintenance and monitor refrigeration and HVAC systems.
Manuel Schönfeld, senior vice president of infrastructure innovation at Qu, said the key tool is a kitchen’s electrical panel.
Qu’s new Smart Kitchen platform can track several pieces of restaurant equipment.
“If you think about it, equipment can vary,” Schönfeld said. “Whether it’s from a manufacturer that is already out of business to those that have been running since the 1970s. What unifies them is that they need energy. We have all these wires from equipment going to an electric panel, and from there, we can read a lot of data. We can read if the equipment is healthy or not.”
In addition to utilizing this data, Schönfeld said the Smart Kitchen builds a digital twin for every piece of equipment in the kitchen. The result is real-time optimization, which is especially important for equipment like fryers.
“It’s one of the most important pieces of equipment in a restaurant, and quite often, we see problems,” Schönfeld said. “It can be oil not being changed on time or the cooking temperature being outside of parameters you want, which can lead to, say, a soggy chicken tender, and then a one-star review. In the end, it can lead to a customer going to a competitor.”
“That can be a heavy impact,” he continued. “So, what can we do about that? We can add temperature sensors that can tell if the oil is in the right parameters. It can track when the oil is supposed to be changed on time. That consistency, quality and compliance with food means real dollars in revenue.”
Hudda said it’s particularly good for franchise concepts, as food quality and safety issues can impact the entire brand.
“It doesn’t matter who owns the location, whether it’s company-owned or franchised, but it can impact the whole,” Hudda said. “Even things like walk-in refrigerator doors being slightly open can make a difference. Instead of waiting for someone to find that, we can add alerts, which can save food being wasted. Restaurant operators are busy, they don’t even have a second to look at these things. Our product can be their eyes and ears.”
In addition to the updated platform in the kitchen, Qu also has more technology to add in the front of the house with guest-facing video boards. Hudda said the boards provide customers with status updates on their order, from when it was placed to when it will be ready.
Digital report shows restaurant priorities
Coinciding with its new rollout of technology was the release of Qu’s State of Digital Report. With input from 170 fast-casual and quick-service restaurant brands representing 85,000 units in the United States, Qu was able to learn what restaurant companies are planning technology-wise in 2025.
To boost operational efficiency, 64 percent of respondents said they planned to consolidate tech stacks, followed by improving online ordering at 58 percent, data and analytic orchestration at 55 percent and installing ordering kiosks at 36 percent. While adding kiosks wasn’t the most prioritized option, the report showed there is great interest in them.
Of all brands surveyed, 62 percent showed some level of kiosk use, with 35 percent already using them, 20 percent in a piloting phase and 7 percent launching them this year. While the majority of the brands use kiosks, though, it remains mostly on the QSR side of the industry, with 80 percent of fast-food restaurants utilizing them, compared to 52 percent of fast-casual concepts.
The barrier to either restaurant model is the same, with the technology being expensive. To assist restaurants with the issue, Hudda said Qu developed a point-of-sale tablet on a swivel which can be turned to face guests at a register as a mini-kiosk. Hudda said it can act as a fully operational kiosk for a restaurant while also testing how guests like it.
Qu CEO Amir Hudda
“Brands can test it, see the interest and people getting higher upsells and decide if they want to invest,” Hudda said. “Kiosks help with your labor costs and it helps with your revenue side. That’s why brands are deploying them at rapid rates.”
Along with operational efficiencies, the report also delved into how brands were approaching ordering in 2025. In terms of what channels are being prioritized, 40 percent of respondents said they were focused on first-party ordering, followed by catering at 24 percent, on-premises ordering at 14 percent and drive-thru at 11 percent. Third-party ordering, meanwhile, was just 7 percent.
“That was one piece that jumped out to me,” Hudda said. “From our perspectives, there are a few things driving that. This is our sixth report and over the last three years, we’ve seen the digital growth start to plateau. That big spurt that happened post-pandemic has now stabilized, so we’re reaching what I call an equilibrium point between digital and in-store sales.”
“They see digital is not going to grow 10 to 20 percent anymore, so how do they’re looking at how to get more revenue out of the business,” he continued. “So, third-party delivery can be problematic because it is expensive. So, they’re saying, maybe we should start focusing on our own digital channels and get more traffic on our own first-party sites.”
This is reflected in the survey as well. When asked what the top areas of technological investment would be, both loyalty programs and mobile app improvements came in at 39 percent, followed by consumer data platforms at 34 percent.
Hudd said this issue also goes back to technology consolidation being prioritized.
“I think brands are at a place where they have their heads above water,” Hudd said. “Before, they were taking orders in whatever way they could. That resulted in proliferation of tech stacks, with your ordering provider and kiosk provider being different companies. So, brands are saying, ‘we need to unify our tech stacks,’ and using that as an opportunity to own their first-party ordering.”
Of the brands surveyed, digital orders make up 26 percent or more of their total sales, while 35 percent reported digital orders representing between 11 percent and 25 percent of all sales.
