FREESTYLE
DESIGN
The cabinetry was designed by the Italian automotive design firm Pininfarina, via their Pininfarina Extra industrial and product design subsidiary.
The Freestyle’s beverage dispensing technology was designed by Dean Kamen, the inventor of the Segway, in return for Coca-Cola distributing his Slingshot water purification system.
The technologies involved include microdispensing technology and proprietary PurePour technology.
Both technologies were originally developed to deliver precise doses of drugs. One Freestyle unit with a similar footprint to a current vending machine can dispense 126 kinds of carbonated and non-carbonated beverages.
Microdosing blends one or more concentrated ingredients stored in packets with water and sweetener at the point where the beverage is dispensed, thus avoiding the use of traditional boxes of syrup (also known as a bag-in-a-box).
Cartridges store concentrated ingredients in the dispenser cabinet and are RFID enabled. The machine uses RFID chips to detect its supplies and to radio resupplying needs to other units.