OneThird, an AI-powered food tech company founded to address the annual loss of one-third of all food produced due to spoilage, announced it had raised $3 Million, bringing the total amount of funding raised to date to $6.1 Million.
OneThird’s AI-powered, near-infrared scanning technology enables growers, food distributors, retailers and consumers to correctly predict the shelf life of fresh produce and minimise food waste. The system supports and anticipates the shelf life of strawberries, tomatoes, blueberries and avocados and will extend to ten varieties of produce by late 2023.
The United Nations reports food waste as a significant sustainable development concern. Nearly one-third of food brought to market yearly is wasted at an estimated cost of $1 trillion; over half of it – 40% – is fresh produce.
The tech has been proven to reduce up to 25% of waste throughout the produce supply chain. In addition, it enables produce supply chain stakeholders with real-time information to help them make decisions like optimising best-before codes, shipping locally or within a shorter trucking distance to maintain shelf-life, or diverting produce that would otherwise spoil by turning it into smoothies, dry, frozen products, soups, and more.
The late seed funding was spearheaded by Dutch-based impact investor Pymwymic (an acronym for “Put Your Money Where Your Meaning Is Community”), with involvement from former investors Halma Ventures Limited, SHIFT Invest and Oost NL.
OneThird will utilise the new capital to scale its technology and operations to expand into new markets and assist fresh produce supply chains in North America and Europe to reduce the $1 trillion wasted annually to food waste due to spoiling.
