Silicon Valley’s $445 million robot pizza revolution that wasn’t

The zesty tale of Zume Pizza, one of the biggest flops in Silicon Valley history.

“What if there was a better way to make and deliver pizza to you?” asked CNBC’s Jim Cramer—shirtsleeves rolled up, wagging his finger at the camera—as he passionately set up a segment of his popular Mad Money show in June 2018. “Turns out, there is, which brings me to Zume, Inc., a Silicon Valley–based startup trying to bring this industry to the modern era.” Cramer, on location in Mountain View, California, and standing in front of a shiny red food truck, quickly introduced Zume’s robots, cuing up footage of a robotic arm balletically moving pizzas in and out of ovens inside a warehouse. This, he intoned, was a revolution. “We automate everything else, why not pizza?”

Read Full Story