Peckish: Harnessing Google Cloud's AI services to optimize restaurant supply chains
About Peckish
Launched in April 2023, Peckish is a Dutch start-up based in Amsterdam. It was founded by two experts in marketplace operations - Harpreet Singh - and in data science - Sébastien Pradier - who have extensive restaurant-industry experience. The company currently employs four people.
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Peckish chose Google Cloud, renowned for its wealth of AI services, to build its restaurant supply chain optimization platform. The company hopes to use its prediction models to cut food waste in the restaurant industry by 50%, while also promoting sustainable growth for millions of restaurants worldwide.
Google Cloud results
- Development and model training facilitated by Vertex AI
- Accelerated development thanks to managed services
- Platform scalability
- Simplified integration of third-party apps and models with Cloud Run
- Restaurant overheads 10 times lower
Inventory times cut from 20 hours to 2
Amsterdam-based B2B start-up Peckish is hoping to revolutionize the restaurant industry by using artificial intelligence and digitization to optimize supply chain and inventory management. The company was founded in 2023 by Harpreet Singh and Sébastien Pradier, whose expertise and industry experience are a clear asset. They may be from different countries—Australia and France respectively—but both have family in the restaurant industry and spent time working at Uber, which is where they met before launching Peckish. They have created a platform that could make restaurant management costs up to 10 times cheaper.
"The restaurant industry produces huge amounts of data, but this data is fragmented and ultimately of little use to restaurant owners," explains Harpreet Singh, CEO of Peckish. "This results in a third of food being wasted, with 71% of this waste occurring before the food is used. On a global scale, this amounts to around 230 billion dollars and accounts for almost 8% of greenhouse gas emissions. At a time when the cost of raw materials is constantly increasing and the sector is facing a shortage of labor—not to mention the challenges associated with sustainability—reducing this waste by even 50% would have a huge impact. And that's precisely the goal we've set ourselves."
"A third of food is wasted, with 71% of this waste occurring before the food is used. On a global scale, this amounts to around 230 billion dollars and accounts for almost 8% of greenhouse gas emissions. Reducing this waste by even 50% would have a huge impact. And that's precisely the goal we've set ourselves."
—Harpreet Singh, CEO of PeckishOptimizing supply-chain management and reducing losses
By bridging the gap between what is sold and what is actually used, Peckish offers a comprehensive solution to a long-standing problem in the food-service industry. Backed by investment from Antler, one of the most important partner VCs for Google Cloud and the Google for Startups Cloud Program, the company released the initial version of its platform in April this year. "Restaurant owners are our primary target," says Sébastien Pradier, CTO of Peckish. "Our goal is to simplify their inventory process and make it more efficient with an automated and affordable solution. As an example, where they might have been spending an average of 20 hours a week on inventory, this will only take them a couple of hours with our platform."
Basically, while an ERP system can tell how many burgers have been sold in a day, Peckish's platform can accurately predict how many tomatoes, how much bread and cheese, or even how much sauce was needed to make those burgers. On this basis, it can precisely monitor stock levels in real time, but also predict supply-chain requirements based on sales history so that the restaurant can place its orders without generating any waste. In the same way, the platform can alert the restaurant owner if it finds any discrepancies in the use of raw materials and sales.
Google Cloud for exceptional AI solutions
"The strength of our platform lies in the accuracy of its forecasting. In this sense, the wealth of models and features available with Vertex AI made development considerably easier for us," explains Sébastien Pradier.
Peckish actually relies on a family of AI models to assess its customers' supply-chain needs. Some of these were developed internally, others rely on Vertex AI's forecasting models. "When it comes to AI, there is no doubt that Google Cloud is the most innovative company out there, with its pre-trained, customizable models. Even when we design our own models, everything has been planned in Vertex AI to make it easier. You plug in your data and then the training process is fully automated. Everything is so intuitive and you don't need to write a single line of code. This means we have a much faster time to market, which is vital for a start-up that needs to move quickly from the idea to getting the solution into production," adds Sébastien Pradier. "What's more, Google Cloud solutions are fully integrated, which makes implementation even easier and avoids wasting time on technical issues that don't really add any business value."
"When it comes to AI, there is no doubt that Google Cloud is the most innovative company out there, with its pre-trained, customizable models. Even when we design our own models, everything has been planned in Vertex AI to make it easier."
—Sébastien Pradier, CTO of PeckishHighly effective tailored support
As part of the Google for Startups Cloud Program because of the partnership between their investor Antler and Google Cloud, Peckish was able to take advantage of financial incentives in the form of credits and discounts on Google Cloud products and services. This financial assistance was greatly appreciated. As Harpreet Singh notes, "Launching a platform requires a lot of testing and this costs money."
But for the Peckish founders, the advantages of the program weren't limited to financial benefits. "We benefited from—and we're still benefiting from—incredibly effective support. Faced with the breadth of cloud services, companies often struggle to understand which products they need to use to work efficiently. Thanks to the tailored support and the responsiveness of our contacts at Google Cloud to every question we asked, we're sure we've built a platform that is not only effective but also highly innovative," says the CEO of Peckish.
The use of Cloud Run, for example, illustrates the innovative approach Peckish used to solve the problem of integrating its customers' data streams. "We designed a highly modular platform that was divided into containerized microservices and run as a serverless environment on Cloud Run. This granular division with microservices accessed via APIs made integration much more flexible," explains Sébastien Pradier.
Google Cloud: a trusted partner to support growth
One year after beginning the initial developments on Google Cloud and now that the company is beginning to gain momentum and take on new customers, Harpreet Singh is glad he chose a reliable and high-performing infrastructure. "Peckish is a software company, meaning we need a sound infrastructure and a reliable partner we can depend on to guarantee the availability of our services, otherwise we risk losing customers. With Google Cloud, we feel safe. We know we can grow and expand internationally, because in terms of performance and processing capability, or even geographical coverage, Google Cloud will be there to support us," says the CEO of Peckish.
In the meantime, Peckish is already planning to work closely with various stakeholders in the supply chain to enhance its platform with new services and deliver greater value to its customers.
"With Google Cloud, we feel safe. We know we can grow and expand internationally, because in terms of performance and processing capability, or even geographical coverage, Google Cloud will be there to support us."
—Harpreet Singh, CEO of PeckishTell us your challenge. We're here to help.
Contact us
About Peckish
Launched in April 2023, Peckish is a Dutch start-up based in Amsterdam. It was founded by two experts in marketplace operations - Harpreet Singh - and in data science - Sébastien Pradier - who have extensive restaurant-industry experience. The company currently employs four people.
About Antler
Antler gives their customers an edge from the very beginning. Build and scale their company faster with our global community of co-founders and access to talent, expert advisors, expansion support, and capital around the world.