Fast-food poised to go high-tech

By Dave Carpenter
Associated Press

McDonald's customers at a Littleton, Colo., restaurant select a meal from a self-service kiosk that will send their orders to their table. The kiosk illustrates the new technology the company is tinkering with for its U.S. eateries. Associated Press

An automated fryer cooks and bags french fries while a vertical grill machine removes patties from the freezer and prepares them — no burger flipper needed.

And everywhere hover friendly staffers, computer-trained in McDonald's hospitality.

This restaurant exists, complete with simulated rush hour, inside a test lab near company headquarters. Even though the "customers" are McDonald's employees, it illustrates the new technology the company is tinkering with as it maps out the future for its 13,000-plus U.S. eateries.

McDonald's, while refocusing its resources on fast-food basics in a bid to end a persistent slump, is counting on concepts such as the ones being tested at its Core Innovation Center to help it regain more of the dominance that once produced record profits for 45 consecutive quarters.

New chairman and CEO Jim Cantalupo's first goal is to "repair" McDonald's with a 12- to 18-month turnaround plan stressing better service and food quality and less expansion and capital spending.

A decision on whether to install the self-service kiosks more broadly is expected by year's end.