Zume Inc., once hailed as the future of food delivery with its robotic pizza-making systems and AI-driven mobile kitchens, officially shut down in June 2023 after burning through $445 million in funding. Despite early media hype and SoftBank’s backing, Zume’s ambitious vision collapsed under technical failures, poor scalability, and a flawed pivot to sustainable packaging. This deep dive reveals why Zume, the robot pizza startup, failed in 2023.