After crashing and burning with its DIY soda concept, Keurig has just announced it’s partnering with Anheuser-Bush InBev to create the “in-home booze maker” of American consumers’ dreams. Neither company is offering substantive details just yet, but the effort will require at least 50 employees in a still-unnamed R&D venture tasked with inventing an appliance that can make push-button “beer, spirits, cocktails, and mixers.”
They’re “still researching” how to make this device, as CNN notes, so it’s unclear what it’ll look like or, frankly, even do. But for a hint, it might make sense for Keurig to build on the foundation of Kold, the soda-making kontraption the company spent six years developing before discontinuing less than a year after it came out. Still, it may be wisest to withhold judgment until the device — whatever form it ultimately takes — actually debuts.
Brewbound suggests the team could be working on an integrated home-brewing system of some kind that would go way beyond Budweiser K-Cups, since AB InBev’s “disruptive growth” division called ZX Ventures recently invested in PicoBrew, a next-level automatic homebrewer that lets people remotely concoct — and even customize — beers from craft-world heavyweights like Abita, 21st Amendment, and Rogue. In reality, it’s probably just a matter of time until someone unveils something like a web-connected Smart-Draft that you’ll be able to activate by yelling, “Alexa, pour me a beer.”
