3-D pizza printer gets investment from Donatos founder

This time next year, a small Columbus start-up could be shipping pizza-building robots across the country.

BeeHex, whose co-founders include a pair of central Ohio natives, raised $1 million to fund the development of a commercial prototype of its Chef 3D, a 3-D printer that can build pizzas with dough, sauce and cheese.

In a twist, the lead investor is Jim Grote, founder of Donatos Pizza and food-processing equipment maker Grote Co.

BeeHex initially was based in California, but moved to Columbus to tap into Grote’s knowledge and work on research and development.

“It’s great to be back in Columbus,” said Jordan French, one of BeeHex’s co-founders, who grew up in Dublin. “Jim is an invaluable resource.”

Grote said the Chef 3D is impressive.

“The technology is unmatched in bringing unique opportunities to the food industry,” Grote said in a news release.

BeeHex co-founder Anjan Contractor, an Ohio State University graduate, said the company has more than the Chef 3D in development. Other pieces, such as a conveyor oven, an ordering and payment interface and an “order topping robot,” are pieces of what the company hopes will be a nearly autonomous solution for commercial customers.

The company launched its Chef 3D system last year and demonstrated it at Ohio State where it formed “Block O” pizzas with little to no human interaction. The machine extrudes dough, sauce and cheese onto parchment paper. A human then tops the pizza and slips it in and out of the oven.

The machine can print a pizza in about one minute. The machines are still in development and not yet available for purchase. BeeHex did not disclose what one might cost.

BeeHex hopes to market its food printers to big retailers, grocery stores, amusement parks, hotels and movie theaters. At least, those are some of the companies that have contacted BeeHex.

“There are big pizza chains that are interested in deploying the technology,” French said. “Big-box retailers, that’s a massive market.

“You drown in opportunity when you have technology like this.”

One interesting idea is to use it on a delivery truck, which could arrive at a customer’s door right as the pizza comes out of the oven, said Dennis Lombardi, principal of Insight Dynamics, a food-service consultancy.

No matter the “wow” factor and flexible use of the technology, it will be measured by one basic thing.

“It may have many applications,” Lombardi said. “But the bottom line of success is how many customers think it makes good-tasting pizza.”

French, of course, thinks the pizza is good, but he wasn’t convinced until a group from Danone, the global food giant and parent of Dannon yogurt, flew in from Paris to check it out last year.

“They wanted to hang out and eat pizza,” French said. “They were surprised that it was absolutely delicious, and those were Parisian palates.”

If it makes a decent, consistent product, vending machines would be a good fit, Lombardi said.

A pizza ATM is up and running at Xavier University in Cincinnati, though the pizza is baked in a college kitchen. The places that the Chef 3D might fit also include catering carts, amusement park kiosks, food tents at music festivals, maybe even kitchen counters.

“Eventually we’ll see 3-D printers next to your microwave and electric can opener,” French said, “but not any time soon.”

—BeeHex co-founder Jordan French