I concur with your suspicion. A quick google of smart fridge startups yields this post as its 5th result.I'll list what my search returned.
1)Ovie.life, which doesn't seem to have launched yet.
2)Karma.life, which came up in an article about it, rather than the website proper, though the .life tld seems like an interesting trend.
3)Whisk.com, which appears to be the most alive, so far, of the companies I found in this space.
4)Brezzl.com, which makes a fridge cam to turn your dumb fridge smart. Because people want smart fridges without spending smart fridge money, ostensibly.
5)ByteFoods.co, which looks a reinvented version of those random food item vending machines. I can't tell if employees pay per item or the client firm pays to keep it stocked, but seems like an interesting perk to have if the latter.
And that's it for the first page of results.
Observations:
1)It seems like every major fridge manufacturer now has a smart fridge offering that already does much of what a pure smart fridge startup would do.
2)Most of the results returned by this query were smart fridge startup adjacent, if I had to rigorously categorize them.
3)Whisk is the only one I think I've heard of, but I'm not sure what it does.
4)I have a wife that does the shopping. Aside from Covid concerns this past year, I wouldn't want to be the one to tell her I've solved the "problem" of her having a recurring task to do that gets her out of the house a few times a week and brings real value to our family, and all with a single click for the low cost $9.99 per month, no less. She might like the extra free time, but I doubt it would be in our combined best interest to have that bit of control and impact taken away from her "for her convenience". Call me crazy, but I'd go as far to say she likes it. She's a homemaker, so I'm assuming a more directly income generating career oriented person would feel differently, especially if the food shopping we're "their task" in a given relationship, unless their partner handled all the home maintenance and yardwork such that nutrient acquisition being left to the subject in question seemed fair, though in our case, Granddad does those things (enjoying his retirement, he says), making the 90 hours a week I spend running my businesses darn enjoyable, I have to say. I'm curious to hear from others if they, or their partners (whether directly queried or as matter of perception) enjoy, or seem to enjoy stopping/going out for groceries (let's assume in the pre-covid times, for argument's sake).
I think my final observation above is what makes smart fridge startups DOA. They're messing with the bread and butter of a demographic that still, despite rapidly a-changing times, make up the vast majority of the bread-spenders, when it comes to nutrients, at least. That might be ill-advised. I who knows. It's not my wheelhouse.
I think I'll wait for a replicator, a la star trek, to hit the local distribution center before I start that conversation with Mrs. Mobley, anyway. I choose life.