#68: Top 5 Challenges of Cold-Chain Logistics and How to Solve Them🥶
Hello,
This newsletter will take you about 4 minutes to read.
I. Spotlight: Top 5 Challenges of Cold-Chain Logistics and How to Solve Them🥶
The distribution of COVID-19 vaccines globally shone a light on cold chain logistics and temperature-controlled transportation, and therefore, the challenges the food industry faces. Vaccines made by Pfizer Inc. and Moderna Inc. are easily spoiled and must be kept at cold, specific temperatures, or they will be thrown away — just like food products.
With so many elements that affect carrier arrival times and the pressure to avoid hefty fines from retailers, there is an urgent need for data and analytics (D&A) systems to optimize temperature-controlled logistics, detect damaged goods, and sort effective storage layouts. Let’s dive in.
Reducing Damaged Goods
Just like how 16,000 vaccine doses were potentially spoiled in Maine and Michigan due to temperature problems, temperature-controlled cold storage food deliveries can also be damaged and wasted.
Physical damage can occur due to packaging integrity or mishandling, contamination, spoilage (where cargo is not ordered in a first-in-first-out approach), and temperature abuse (when food needed to be stored at zero degrees is kept at room temperature). These kinds of problems with supply chains are contributing to the 1.4 billion pounds of food wasted each year.
Computer vision systems can identify physical damage that can also happen as a result of temperature changes, by classifying images of products traveling through a distribution center and comparing them to non-damaged images. You can trace the damage depth and type and take an actionable approach to reduce further damage to your products.
Temperature abuse, leading to damaged goods, can also be related to external factors like transportation delays.
II. Industry Roundup:
1. Article: Top business challenges to solve with data analytics
04 minutes | MIT Sloan | Sara Brown
MIT Sloan's Business Analytics Capstone saw students tackle real-world company challenges in 2023. Projects ranged from assessing innovation with patents to AI-enhanced drug safety. Key industry questions included leveraging data for geographic growth, supporting front-line workers, and maximizing insights from unwieldy datasets. This is a great collection of potential projects where AI can be applied to solve key industry challenges - do check out the Capstone project repository link at the bottom of the article.
2. Podcast: Short-term and long-term value with AI
34 minutes | Accenture | Jeff Kaminski and Krishna Cheriath
What are some key prerequisites to integrate data analytics into your business strategy? Jeff Kaminski of Accenture and Krishna Cheriath of Zoetis highlight 3 things: operate with strategic clarity, plan for immediate and long-term value generation, and align analytics initiatives with business objectives. They use an interesting "Ferrari and cargo ship" analogy to highlight the importance of balancing quick solutions and long-term foundational investments.
III. From my Desk:
1. Post: Understanding User Behavior
01 min | LinkedIn
Many business leaders assume that understanding user behavior is a one-and-done task, but it's anything but that in the rapidly evolving digital landscape. Why is this notion outdated, and how does the shifting nature of user expectations necessitate a fresh, ongoing approach? I answer these questions in my LinkedIn post.
Thank you for subscribing and reading the newsletter. I appreciate your attention,
Ganes.
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I’m Ganes Kesari. I publish ‘Data-Driven Future’ to help understand how data shapes our world, explore key trends, and explain what they mean for you today. I speak and write to demystify data science for decision-makers and organizations.
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