DATAFLUCT, first company to use AI at groceries to tackle food waste

DATAFLUCT, Inc., a Japanese startup, recruited partners in October for their new data service called ‘DATAFLUCT foodloss’. It uses artificial intelligence (AI) to reduce food loss and boost profit margin at grocery retailers across the country.

AI analyzes enormous amount of data from retailers to predict and make the most efficient decisions for each store. The Machine Learning algorithm AI makes it possible to learn from experience that will be utilized to make predictions and decisions. DATAFLUCT foodloss not only analyzes data from the past, but it puts information such as weather, temperature and day of the week into account to predict demand precisely.

Retailers are therefore capable of getting the perfect amount of supply at the best timing and need not worry about overstocking that will lead to food loss due to overstocking. Making the ordering process efficient also means resolving inventory stockouts—lost sales opportunity—that will also influence the retailer’s profit margin.

The main functions DATAFLUCT foodloss has are; demand prediction, dynamic pricing, future prediction, dynamic labeling and visualizing data.

• Demand prediction will make the most efficient order for minimizing both overstocking and out-of-stock, thus maximizing the retailer’s revenue. It analyzes both POS (point of sale) data and external data (such as weather, human flow and store location) to calculate the demand precisely.
• Dynamic pricing function enables price optimization. It shows when to make discounts as well as the ideal price and quantity.
• Future prediction will warn which products are likely to be left on the shelves by analyzing weather conditions.
• Dynamic labelling not only makes efficient discount decisions, but it promotes the discount appropriately by revising stickers that retailers use on products that are marked down.
• Visualizing data will notify the headquarters on the sales, stock and waste of each retail chain stores. Staff at each store can notify the headquarters on the best time and discount to sell off products.

This AI system will eliminate food loss by revising the ordering process, thus contributing to resolving food waste issue the society is facing today. Making accurate and efficient orders have always been burdensome and time-consuming for workers at retailers, often resulting in overstocking and discarding food. However, AI can do this with ease and in high speed, far beyond human capability, which in turn allows human workers to concentrate on other work that AI is not assigned to do.

DATAFLUCT is planning to use AI for the whole supply chain in the future; the manufacturer, wholesaler and retailer. By using AI, diverse industries can cooperate mutually to minimize both product shortage and overstocking. Improving sales performance and building a more sustainable society at the same time seems possible by taking advantage of this alluring technology.