Mill Uses AI to Help Restaurants Reduce Food Waste

Mill, a startup that has raised over $232 million since its 2020 launch, is developing an AI-powered system to help restaurants reduce food waste. The company, previously known for its home kitchen bin that dries and shrinks food waste, is now targeting commercial kitchens after receiving requests from businesses like Whole Foods. Food waste from restaurants and grocery stores accounts for approximately a quarter of the 74 million tons of food discarded annually in the U.S., contributing significantly to emissions and business costs.

Mill CEO and cofounder Matt Rogers, who previously worked on the original iPhone at Apple and cofounded Nest, stated that food waste presents a "massive scale impact" opportunity that is "win-win across the board and is a solvable problem." The new commercial product aims to tackle this issue from two primary angles. First, it processes kitchen scraps into a lightweight, odorless material suitable for use as chicken feed or for composting at farms. Second, and crucially, the system incorporates AI to analyze the specific types of food being discarded.

This AI analysis is designed to provide actionable insights to kitchens, enabling them to make operational changes that minimize waste generation in the first place. According to cofounder Harry Tannenbaum, the system begins by dehydrating food scraps, a process informed by the insight that "25% of the landfill is food and 80% of food is water." This pre-processing step is fundamental to the system's ability to transform waste into a usable material while also preparing it for detailed analysis.

The development of this commercial product involves extensive research, with Mill's design team spending hundreds of hours in commercial kitchens to understand the intricacies of waste management. Prototypes are currently being tested at Mill's offices south of San Francisco, demonstrating the system's functionality. By combining dehydration technology with advanced AI analytics, Mill aims to offer a practical and impactful solution to the significant challenge of food waste in the restaurant industry, addressing both environmental concerns and economic efficiencies.