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Didn't Dean Kamen invent those to get funding to make water purifiers.

Essentially yes. Distribution, instead of funding.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coca-Cola_Freestyle

"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."

You're talking about the "coke freestyle" machines. Yes that story is true for those machines, but McDonalds doesn't use them.

(Burger king does)

McDonalds did have them for a few years. Allegedly they went back to the tried and true because the maintenance costs were too high.

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