Tech Startup Sues McDonald's For $900 Million Over Broken Ice Cream Machines

McDonald's is being sued for $900 million by a startup that claims to have invented a device to fix the fast food chain's ice cream machines.

Kytch's case had been anticipated for a long time. According to Wired, they claim McDonald's engaged in deceptive advertising and other tactics.

In a complaint filed on March 1, Kytch claimed that McDonald's sent franchisees emails claiming that Kytch's gadgets broke the machines' warranties and intercepted their sensitive data.

According to Kytch, a device the size of a phone has been implanted inside damaged McDonald's ice cream machines since 2019.

These gadgets would then intercept the internal communications of the ice cream machines and relay signals to a smartphone or web device to assist store owners in repairing their equipment.

However, things went south for Kytch and McDonald's in November 2020. The fast-food giant emailed all franchisees requesting that the device be removed from their machines.

McDonald's said Kytch's device infringed on the machine's warranties, "intercepted personal information," and may even "lead to significant human injury."

"Nothing is more important to us than food quality and safety, which is why all equipment in McDonald's restaurants is thoroughly vetted before it's approved for use," a McDonald's spokesperson said in an IGN report.

"After we learned that Kytch's unapproved device was being tested by some of our franchisees, we held a call to better understand what it was and subsequently communicated a potential safety concern to franchisees. There's no conspiracy here," the spokesperson added.

Kytch refuted the human injury accusations and called the claims "defamatory."

The emails, according to Nelson, caused not only malfunctioning ice cream equipment but also slowing sales for the firm just as it was getting off.

According to the Miami Herald, Kytch retaliated against McDonald's ice cream shop in May 2020, suing Taylor and its distributor TFG for theft of trade secrets.

Taylor collaborated with TFG and another franchise owner to get their device, reverse-engineer it, and reproduce its features, according to the Kytch inventors.

The co-founders of Kytch, on the other hand, have intimated that they want to use the investigation in their lawsuit against Taylor to obtain evidence for a lawsuit against McDonald's.

Kytch got around 800 pages of Taylor's emails and presentations, which revealed that McDonald's, not Taylor, was in charge of developing a response to Kytch in 2020.

McDonald's has always collaborated with other businesses in order to improve their offerings. Tech Times added that McDonald's partnered with IBM for its drive-thru system in 2021.