What's stopping someone from swiping an extra bag of chicken tenders? This design has the same flaw as the newspaper vending machine box. Pay once, take a bunch. Perhaps people are more honest in Shanghai compared to Western countries.
I expect a combination of facial recognition and social credit score would deter theft pretty well.
I'm kind of assuming (but couldn't quite tell from the pics) that it's more like a mobile vending machine. That is, there is one area for storage and another for dispensing.
Presumably they could have a camera that charges for whatever you take, like Amazon Go stores
Population density plays a role. You can’t do that in a Disneyland, for example.