Bamboo Bowls: IoT food pods, from 3D design to a connected restaurant

Bamboo Bowls wanted a restaurant where customers order on their phone, at a kiosk or on the web, then collect their meal from a smart pod without queuing at a counter or waiting for staff.

That meant building the physical pods and all the software around them. The system had to:

• take orders from several channels and send them to one kitchen in real time
• know which pods are free, reserve one for each order and never double-book
• rotate a pod from the kitchen side to the customer side when the meal is ready, and back again after pickup
• let customers open their pod from the app, reliably, in a busy restaurant
• run loyalty, promotions and reporting from a central admin
• look good and feel robust in a public dining room: a pod customers trust, set flush into the restaurant wall

We took Bamboo Bowls from concept to a working restaurant in one continuous build: 3D design, prototype, production pods, IoT connectivity, then the apps and in-store systems, all tied together by one central platform.

Industrial and 3D design of the pods

• We designed the pod from scratch in 3D: a white spherical pod that rotates inside a round light-wood frame, set flush into the restaurant wall.
• One side faces the kitchen for loading and the other faces the customer for pickup, with a shelf sized for the restaurant's bowls.

Prototype to production

• We built and tested working prototypes of the pod and its rotation mechanism.
• We refined the design into production pods that ran daily service in the restaurant.

IoT connectivity and pod control

• Each pod is registered with its name, hardware address, area and status.
• When an order is ready, the kitchen assigns it a free pod, which is held for that order for 45 minutes.
• The branch server sends a TLS-encrypted MQTT command to rotate the pod to the customer side. About 30 seconds after the customer opens it, a background job turns it back to the kitchen and releases it for the next order.
• Staff controls open or close all pods, take a pod out of service or turn any single pod by hand.
• QR-triggered pod opening for reward collection.

Customer mobile app

• iOS and Android app with menu, add-ons, cart, checkout with saved cards, and phone sign-up with OTP.
• Live order tracking (preparing, ready, pod assigned) with an "open pod" button, plus a pickup-window flow for items not served in pods.
• Order history, invite-a-friend, live chat and push notifications.

Self-service kiosk and web ordering

• A touchscreen kiosk with menu, recommended items, add-ons, cart, OTP to link the order to the customer, then payment.
• Browser ordering with store selection, card payments, OTP verification and PDF receipts.

POS, kitchen display and pickup screens

• A kitchen display system for incoming orders, with one-tap assignment of a ready order to a pod or pickup window.
• A drink-bar status screen and customer-facing "ready orders" screens.
• POS for counter orders, inventory and branch reports.
• Real-time updates across every screen over WebSockets.

Central platform and admin

• One central system connecting the pods, app, kiosk, web, POS and kitchen screens, so every order, pod and screen shares the same live state.
• Stores, menu, inventory, orders, customers and users in one admin.
• A loyalty programme with points, tiers, rewards, challenges and events, plus promotions and reports with Excel export.

• Bamboo Bowls operated in Singapore for about three years on the pods and platform we built.
• One team delivered the whole product, from 3D design and prototype through production pods, IoT and every app.
• A complete order-to-pickup flow across four ordering channels (app, kiosk, web and POS), one kitchen system and IoT pods.
• Pods are reserved per order and recycled automatically after pickup, with no staff hand-off needed.