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Don’t Throw It Out, Sort It!Don’t Throw It Out, Sort It!
PepsiCo partners with Intuitive AI’s automated Oscar Sort system to make easier, cleaner work of recycling and sortation.
3 Min Read
Intuitive AI / PepsiCo
At a Glance
- PepsiCo is the first global beverage brand to work with Intuitive AI’s automated station and will deploy it soon.
- Dubbed “Oscar Sort,” the station’s camera, display screen, and waste receptacles take the confusion out of recycling.
- The sortation station can even tell consumers to pour out their liquids or even split the lids and sleeves from coffee cups.
When it comes to recycling, it’s easy for consumers to get annoyed with the process of washing and sorting their recyclable refuse. PepsiCo is hoping to improve recycling efforts with a cool new partnership with Intuitive AI, makers of Oscar Sort, an zero-touch, recycling assistant that uses artificial intelligence (AI) to make it a bit more fun for consumers to accurately and responsibly dispose of their food and beverage packaging.
Each Oscar Sort station is equipped with a camera, display screen, and waste receptacles. Consumers simply hold the item they’d like to recycle up the camera — the station will recognize the item and tell the consumer which bin to drop the item into.
Consumers hold the item to be recyled and the AI-aided camera tells them where to put it. (Image: Intuitive AI)
The technology behind Oscar Sort is also capable of defining potential liquids or leftover organics that could be present in bottles and food boxes and provide precise disposal instructions for virtually any common materials that are ready to be discarded. For instance, consumers can be prompted to pour out their liquids or even split the lids and sleeves from coffee cups.
Intuitive AI says this gamified operational platform is a “powerful behavioral change concept” and affectionately refer each interaction as a “nudge.”
In addition to welcoming users when they stand in front of the station and showing them how to sort their refuse, Oscar can also reward them when they get it right or deliver a cheeky bit of light public shaming when they get it wrong.
Intuitive AI says Oscar Sort’s ability to automate waste auditing can contribute to a 300% increase in recycling with a 40% savings in operations.
PepsiCo’s Plans for Oscar Sort.
PepsiCo is the first global beverage company to work with Intuitive AI and plans to dispatch Oscar Sort technology to high-traffic customer locations in the near future, which will likely include PepsiCo offices and select customer partner locations like universities, airports, malls, and stadiums. It’s part of the company’s award-winning pep+ Partners for Tomorrow platform that brings scaled sustainability capabilities to consumers.
Although PepsiCo declined to offer Packaging Digest specifics on cost and rollout timing, Emma Stradling, senior director of sustainability for PepsiCo Beverages North America said via press release that identifying partners and finding the right locations the initiative can “help our customer partners improve their recycling accuracy and increase waste diversion rates at their locations to keep valuable materials in the supply chain.”
To that end, Intuitive AI says Oscar can not only send alerts when bins are full to optimize disposals, it will also help companies like PepsiCo analyze their Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) reporting and waste pickup trends.
Partnering with PepsiCo will expand Oscar Sort’s reach in high-traffic public spaces. “Together, we’re aiming to improve circularity and educate consumers in a fun and engaging way,” said Hassan Murad, CEO & Co-Founder of Intuitive AI.
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