CANADA – P&P Optica (PPO), a startup behind automated inspection and insights for the food industry, has received up to a CAD$2.4 million (US$1.78m) investment from Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada.
The funding, made through the department’s AgriInnovate Program, is intended to be allocated towards promoting the company’s hyperspectral technology to the meat processing sector.
In addition, the investment will enable the Waterloo-based to support its expansion plans in the meat processing space across North America, and enter new global markets as well as other parts of the food industry.
Founded in 1995 by researchers Romuald (Romek) Pawluczyk and Pierre Peltier, PPO is on a mission to help food processors make safer, higher-quality food while reducing waste and increasing the sustainability of the food supply.
Initially, it started out as a research and consulting company based in Québec City, focusing on the fiber business and spectroscopy. The startup later, in 2012, began exploring opportunities in different industries, such as plastics and oil sands.
By 2015, PPO pivoted to developing solutions for the food processing industry, developing a Smart Imaging System that uses hyperspectral imaging to gather rich data on every product it inspects, down to the chemical signature.
Using color and moisture analysis, PPO imaging technology provides informative data to meat processors to help them understand their products’ contents.
The system automates food inspection processes by assessing qualities such as tenderness; protein, water, and fat content; and freshness. It can also identify and remove foreign objects such as plastics, bone, and rubber.
This means that the system can provide information on quality metrics such as the fat/lean ratio for products like bacon and sausage, measure the tenderness of steaks, and identify muscle myopathies such as woody breast in chicken.
According to PPO, processors can use its technology to assess product quality in real time and reduce food waste by helping predict potential food safety issues and prevent losses from potential contamination or product recalls.
The funding from the Canadian government follows a round B series the company closed in June 2021, which was led by Ag Capital Canada and with new investor Synovus Family Office as well as existing investors Fulcrum Global Capital, Export Development Canada (EDC), and others.
The company said the funds from the series would be used to accelerate the implementation of PPO’s detection system in food processing plants across Canada and the US as well as to expand the development of the company’s advanced software and insights for the food processing industry.
This includes artificial intelligence (AI) tools that enable processors to collect, view, and analyze detailed information about food composition and quality in real time.
PPO’s offering is currently used in over 10 facilities across Canada and the United States, including Hormel Foods, Brakebush Brothers, and Fieldale Farms.
This Series B funding round also followed earlier investments by Fulcrum Capital in 2017 and the EDC in 2018.
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