CHINA'S CHIP LABOUR CHIME

THE LITTLE robotic wheels up to the table, raises its glass lid to reveal a steaming plate of local  Shanghai-style crayfish and announced in low, mechanical tones, ''Enjoy your meal.''

The futuristic restaurant concept is the latest initiative in Chinese -e-commerce giant Alibaba's push  to modernise service and retail in a country when robotics and artificial intelligence are increasingly being integrated into commerce.

Raising efficiency and lowering labour costs are the objectives of Alibaba's ''Robot.He'' diners, where waiters have been replaced by robots which roll around the dining room on table-high runaways.

''In Shanghai, a waiter costs up to 10,000  yuan [ $1,500}  per month. That's hundreds of thousands in cost every year. And two shifts of people are needed,'' said Cao Haitao, the Alibaba product manager who developed the concept.

'' But we don't need two shifts for robots and they are on duty every day.''

The dineers are attached to Alibaba's new Hema chain : of semi-automated supermarkets, where grocery shoppers fill their ''carts''  on a mobile app and have the mechandise brought to them at checking via conveyor tracks on the ceiling, or delivered straight to their homes.

Alibaba now has 57 Hema markets in 13 Chinese cities, all of which will eventually feature the robotic restaurants.

Industry experts say they serve more as showcases of Alibababa's  technology prowess than a   serious business model in a country where labour costs are relatively low.

But the restaurants also typify the  rapid adoption of new technologies  in a country where the  government  is increasingly using, facial-recognition  technology to police streets and identify law-breakers.

The Honor and Serving og this latest  Global Operational Research on Technology, Automation and Jobs continues.