The service element of restaurants will be very difficult for artificial intelligence to replace, according to tech entrepreneur, author and futurist, Tom Weaver.
“You’re still going to need restaurants; people are still going to want to go out and eat and have experiences,” he told MCA’s Hostech conference.
Whilst industries such as law and copywriting may face uncertain futures with the development of opensource AI, such as ChatGPT, Weaver said that it is “good news” for the hospitality industry.
“Restaurants are very difficult for AI to replace, certainly on the service element side of things”.
He said that although there are not many practical examples of AI usage across the industry, there is high potential for businesses to optimise how they use their data.
“In the hospitality space you have data all over the place, front end, and back end, but it is quite inaccessible right now.
“The biggest thing you will probably see in the next few years is developers starting to hook up all the existing platforms that you’ve got to Chat GPT, and you will be able to use natural language to ask questions of your own data.
“From a practical perspective that is one of the biggest changes you will see in your day-to-day life”.
Weaver pointed towards a recent case in which a coffee shop is using AI to monitor via CCTV, how many drinks staff are making, and how long customers are spending in store.
He added that within the next year, we can expect to see other capabilities grow, such as an agent which can regularly monitor the gap between NPS scores and staff ratings, and flagging when there is a big disparity between these two data points.
“You’ll know in a much clearer way what is actually going on, to give you insights that you may not have been able to come to yourself,” he explains.
Weaver said that arguably, AI is changing productivity around the globe at a faster pace than anything since the invention of the personal computer.
The most profound potential is in text to code AI, he adds.
“You don’t need as many developers to create a new business anymore,” he said, and in the office, this could create a 40% increase in productivity per head.
This gives businesses a decision as to whether they increase overall productivity with the same workforce or decrease headcount.
Considering some of the dangers surrounding emerging AI technologies, Weaver warned, “the biggest risk to everyone in this room, is on a personal level, fraud.
The open-source nature of many AI programmes also means it will be almost “impossible” to control, with the potential for deep-fakes causing “havoc”.
