Cold chain firm tracks fresh produce shipments

Cold chain monitoring firm Verigo has launched a quality analysis platform that could allow food growers, shippers, and retailers to reduce the billions of dollars in product lost each year to spoilage in transit, the company said.

Verigo's "Pod Quality" product uses pallet-level monitoring to deliver real-time analysis of fresh products as they ship, the Gainesville, Fla.-based company said. That information can allow growers, wholesalers, and retailers to improve the freshness and reduce the shrink of fresh produce in transit, Verigo said.

Pod Quality's Internet of Things (IoT)-based quality management system works by combining wireless "Pod" devices, mobile apps, and cloud-based record-keeping, then produces metrics for stakeholders. "This is the first system that empowers growers, shippers, and retailers with actionable data to optimize post-harvest, inventory rotation, and routing decisions," Verigo founder and President Adam Kinsey said in a statement.

Verigo has designed Pod Quality to address a large market in the produce industry, where more than $7 billion worth of fresh food products shipped in North America every year spoil in the back of a truck or a warehouse before reaching a consumer, the company said.

"This concept [smart shelf-life management] has been around for a long time, but it has never actually been developed and released as a usable product," Kinsey said. "Technology has finally made it simple and feasible to monitor from farm to retail on the pallet level."