Build together. Grow together.

At Blendid, we’re committed to fueling everyone’s life through safe and empowering food choices. We believe the very best of AI-based robotics and new engineering possibilities will elevate our collective experience with food.

As we head into a new future, our focus is on building autonomous robotic kiosks. Our leadership team’s deep expertise ranges from all facets of the food industry to machine learning software to operations. This means we have a pretty good shot at building the new future in food. And we’re already underway.

Our Mission

Blendid is transforming how and what we eat, one robotic kiosk at a time

Many of us strive to eat healthier, especially when on-the-go, but getting access to food that fits our unique health needs and our unique tastes preferences is hard.

That’s why we created Blendid, a contactless and autonomous robotic food kiosk that uses advanced technology – including robotics, machine vision, and artificial intelligence – to prepare and serve healthy and delicious food, customized to your preferences.

Our company is a collective of amazing people striving to build a delightful product.

Our Journey

It all began in 2015. Our three co-founders, Venki Ayalur, Vipin Jain, and Vijay Dodd wanted to have fresh, healthy and personalized food available for anyone, anytime, anywhere. As seasoned techies and entrepreneurs, they pondered how technology could help.

Creating food that is tailored to an individual’s specific needs is difficult and time-consuming when prepared in a traditional kitchen. But, when leveraging technology – specifically robotics, machine learning and AI – they thought there could be a way to automate the process, thereby creating efficiencies and enabling accessibility more broadly and at a reasonable price.

After much trial and error, the Blendid concept was finally created. Finally, in March 2019 the first Blendid commercial kiosk was launched in market.

While we started with a robotic smoothie kiosk, our vision is to serve a complete array of healthy, affordable foods using robotics. Our goal is to deploy these kiosks in all types of food service environments. Our advanced food operating system will expand and adapt to other formats and cuisines including soups, bowls, and more.

Our Leadership

Venki-Ayalur-CTO-and-Co-founder-Blendid-200x300_edited.jpg

CEO & CO-FOUNDER

VIPIN

JAIN

Vipin Jain brings more than 28 years of experience in engineering, consumer product development, and successful serial entrepreneurship to the Blendid team.

Prior to co-founding Blendid in 2015, Vipin was the CEO of Retrevo before it was acquired by Barnes & Noble. The eCommerce company was recognized by Time Magazine as the Best Shopping Website of 2011. Additionally, Vipin also co-founded Telseon, a metro broadband service provider that was acquired by OnFiber/Qwest Communications.

Apart from heading successful startups, Vipin served in a variety of leadership roles at 3com, Extreme Networks, and Barnes & Noble Nook Media. His current goal and passion is to realize his dream with Blendid and use robotics & AI to revolutionize contactless food prep.

VP ENGINEERING & CO-FOUNDER

VIJAY

DODD

With over 28 years of experience in hardware and software product life cycles under his belt, Vijay Dodd brings a wealth of knowledge and engineering leadership to the Blendid executive team.

Prior to co-founding Blendid in 2015, Vijay’s career notably spanned AT&T, Palm, and Barnes & Noble Nook as he acquired his specialty in Industrial & Product Design and innovative ME materials.

CTO & CO-FOUNDER

VENKI

AYALUR

Venki Ayalur’s deep technology expertise spans a career of 25 years and involves being at the forefront of market defining, innovative technologies.

Prior to co-founding Blendid in 2015, Venki conceptualized and oversaw the creation of software and hardware products for companies such as Barnes & Noble Nook and Motorola Mobile. A few of his notable accomplishments are the color-based e-reader, evolution of Motorola phones from StarTacs to Razrs to Android, and being awarded multiple patents in the machine learning and location discovery space.

VP OF BUSINESS OPERATIONS

RAM

NAGARAJAN

Ram Nagarajan brings more than 23 years of experience in technology, consumer products, and B2B services to Blendid.

He’s launched numerous high profile consumer products for universally recognizable brands such as Nook, Samsung, Netflix, and DirecTV. His success in delivering critical, complex, and cross-functional programs from concept to market is what drives him to do the same at Blendid.