Insights

What we are building at Palona, what we are seeing across restaurant operations, and where we think AI in the physical world goes next.

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Interaction Understanding: The Missing Layer for Physical AI

The physical world is not a collection of isolated objects. It is a stream of interactions. A customer operating a vending machine.A guest occupying a table.An employee handling food.A container left on the floor.A person looking at a menu board.A car entering another vehicle’s blind spot.A robot aligning a tool with an object. In each case, the important signal is not the presence of a single object. The value comes from understanding how people, objects, places, and processes relate to each...

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The World Cup Was a Revenue Expansion Opportunity for Restaurants. Did You Catch It?

Spain won the World Cup this Sunday in dramatic fashion, securing a 1-0 win against Argentina with a goal in the 106th minute. Congratulations to Spain, and my apologies to the Argentina fans reading this. But aside from stellar soccer, the World Cup also brought an interesting development to the restaurant industry. For 6 weeks, restaurants ranging from quick service to fine dining started airing the game. The result was watch parties that rivaled those of sports bars. The best part? It...

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From Pilot to Profit: Shawn AI’s Second Record Father’s Day at Cali BBQ

On Father’s Day 2025, Cali BBQ introduced a new kind of teammate: Shawn AI, a customized Palona AI voice agent modeled after founder Shawn Walchef. While the restaurant team focused on smoking meat, serving guests, and keeping up with its busiest day of the year, Shawn AI answered more than 150 calls, handled orders, and made sure customers were not met with a busy signal. It was an important first test. Shawn AI showed that an AI agent could operate in a real restaurant, under real pressure,...

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Why Palona Is Not A Dating App

Every so often, someone asks me the same question. You were the CTO at Tinder. Why didn’t you just build another dating app? I understand why they ask. I joined Tinder in 2016 after years at Yahoo, where I was a VP of Engineering. At the time, the move puzzled people. Yahoo was large and established. Tinder was smaller, scrappier, and carried plenty of negative press. From the outside, it looked like a step down. To me, it was never about company size. It was about the problem. What Actually...

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