Urban Sharing Platform Commercializes 'AI Alcohol Unmanned Vending Machine'

Vision Declaration Ceremony Held on the 24th
Commercialization Model, Support for Small Business Owners

On the 24th, at the 'AI Alcohol Unmanned Vending Machine' Commercialization Vision Declaration Ceremony, (from left) Lee Jung-yong, CEO of Hanasis, Park Jin-seok, CEO of City Sharing Platform, and Park Jung-woo, CEO of Soynet, are taking a commemorative photo.

[Asia Economy Reporter Seungjin Lee] Dosigongyu Platform announced on the 24th that it has commercialized the 'AI Alcohol Unmanned Vending Machine (AISS Go),' which completely blocks underage alcohol purchases through facial recognition and mobile phone age verification for consumers intending to buy alcoholic beverages.

The AI alcohol unmanned vending machine operates on a 'grab-and-go' system where the vending machine door opens once the consumer completes adult verification via facial recognition, allowing the selection of displayed products, and automatically completes payment when the door is closed. It is an unmanned sales system combining patented artificial intelligence computer vision object recognition technology and mass sensor technology.

Until now, alcohol could not be sold through vending machines in Korea. Instead, alcohol is sold at restaurants or convenience stores after verifying that the buyer is an adult aged 19 or older through facial recognition or ID verification.

The commercialization of the alcohol unmanned vending machine comes 10 months after being selected as a demonstration special case company allowed to sell alcohol via AI unmanned vending machines in the 'Industrial Convergence Regulatory Sandbox' jointly hosted by the Korea Chamber of Commerce and Industry and the Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy at the end of June last year. After the 'Industrial Convergence Regulatory Special Committee,' the National Tax Service revised the 'Order Delegation Notice on the Method of Transfer and Receipt of Alcohol, Counterparties, and Others' on December 31 last year, permitting the installation and sale of alcohol vending machines in small business restaurants.

As a result, restaurants, neighborhood supermarkets, specialized liquor stores, convenience stores, and others nationwide can prevent concerns about youth ID forgery, and it is expected to reduce the burden on small business owners with labor shortages, such as single-person stores. Dosigongyu Platform plans to prioritize distributing the alcohol unmanned vending machines to food self-employed businesses burdened by labor costs due to the prolonged COVID-19 pandemic and expand distribution through the Ministry of SMEs and Startups' Smart Supermarket Support Project (Neighborhood Supermarket Unmanned Automation Project).

Since being selected as a special case company last year, Dosigongyu Platform has been working on the final system stabilization of the alcohol unmanned vending machine together with Hanasis, the number one company in the kiosk field, and Soynet, the number one company in AI execution accelerators. It is also significant that the system stabilization was completed through collaboration among small and medium-sized enterprises without support from large corporations.

Lee Jung-yong, CEO of Hanasis, said, "It is very meaningful that three small and medium-sized enterprises cooperated in research to commercialize this for the first time in Korea," adding, "We will increase investment in developing affordable unmanned devices so that small business owners struggling due to COVID-19 can receive help and expand the unmanned vending machine market."

Park Jung-woo, CEO of Soynet, said, "Soynet's AI model installed in the unmanned alcohol vending machine maintains 99% accuracy with the same 32-bit method as server-grade," adding, "Even if this product expands nationwide, computing power is distributed within the unmanned vending machine, enabling stable service support."

Park Jin-seok, CEO of Dosigongyu Platform, also said, "We hope the commercialization of the adult verification AI alcohol unmanned vending machine will greatly help small business owners nationwide facing the era of contactless unmanned services by easing their labor," expressing hope that "since it is purely domestic technology, we hope to pioneer overseas markets in the future."

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.