Food & Beverage

Checklist for a successful digital

transformation in the food and
beverage industry

From bakeries to zucchini farmers, food and

beverage companies are eager to pursue avenues
of growth. Many endeavor to jumpstart these
opportunities by embracing modernization and
adopting digital strategies. New technologies
offer exciting ways to leverage data, engage with
customers, and automate processes. As a result,
new and innovative ways of looking at products
and the supply chain develop, transforming how
we do business. While the potential impact of
digital transformation is promising, it can also be
intimidating. Where do you start? How do you
measure success?
To answer these and other critical questions,
use this checklist to help guide your successful
digital deployment. This checklist is based on the
Constellation Research report, “Nine Entry Points to
Digital Transformation in Manufacturing,”
by R “Ray” Wang.

Food & Beverage Industry Checklist 1

Target these nine milestones as your digital plans move
into high gear

Tactic Benefits
Define a clear mission. Your personnel, partners, and customers will be able
Turn to page 3 to learn more. to easily understand your goals.

Invest in innovative thinkers. Creative problem solvers will inspire innovation

Turn to page 3 to learn more. and help set a vision for the future.

Focus on business models first, technology Your technology will closely align with the business
second. Turn to page 3 to learn more. needs, eliminating superfluous investment.

Move to data-driven decisions. Fact-based decisions are sound and reliable—

Turn to page 3 to learn more. invoking confidence and generating logical results.

Partners will bring specialized expertise and

Focus on co-innovation and co-creation with
fresh ideas, providing components and services
partners. Turn to page 4 to learn more. cost effectively.

A team approach will drive innovation and allow

Create cross-functional teams to execute
groups to concentrate on one singular aspect for
ideas. Turn to page 4 to learn more. greater efficiency.

Broadening service offers will meet customer

Expand service offerings and customer
expectations, create differentiation, and help build
engagement. Turn to page 6 to learn more. customer loyalty.

Enhance the supply chain and connected A fully connected supply network optimizes the
networks. Turn to page 6 to learn more. scheduling of resources, improving delivery times.

Data collected from equipment sensors helps identify

Keep equipment running.
early warning signs, so preemptive measures can be
Turn to page 7 to learn more. taken to prevent downtime.

Food & Beverage Industry Checklist 2

The details
1 3
Define a clear mission
Your digital action plan must start with the key
mission you hope to achieve. This should be
related to the very core of why your organization
exists. What experiences and products do you
want to offer? You must be crystal clear on this
point. Although product and service offerings
are often blended today, you need to be able
to clearly define your goal. If you can’t articulate
your mission, chances are your personnel,
partners, and customers will be confused
and unreceptive.
2
Invest in innovative thinkers
Balancing the workforce between doers and
thinkers is important. Every company in the food
and beverage industry has a mix of hands-on
workers and managers who focus on bottom-
line profitability. But you also need the creative
problem solvers who can bring imagination
and a vision for the future. “If an organization
has many scientists, technologists, engineers,
or mathematicians, it should add artists,
ethnographers, anthropologists, design thinking
experts, and story tellers,” says Wang. Different
perspectives can spark creative thoughts and
fresh approaches to solving business problems.
Encourage these individuals from divergent
disciplines to form teams and learn from
each other.
Food & Beverage Industry Checklist
Focus on business models first
Conceptualize your business model first, then
decide how to execute it. Keep in mind you can
have more than one business model and multiple
revenue streams. Start from a core objective and
then work out what technologies, people, and
systems you need to support the model. Multiple
layers of partner networks, ingredient suppliers,
processors, and packagers may be involved, as
well the need to manage seasonal variables.
Map these out early and in detail, as these
contributors will likely impact the cost of doing
business and margins.
4
Move to data-driven decisions
Data makes the digital engine run. To take
advantage of modern capabilities, you need
devices and systems for collecting, storing, and
aggregating millions of random data points into
logical patterns. Smart sensors that monitor and
communicate condition and location are the
driving force behind many digital initiatives. In
food and beverage, sensors are used to monitor
environmental temperature (from shipping to
storage and processing), optimize feeding herds
and growing crops, and track weather and soil
variables. Data points can also come from batch
formulas, sales, consumer trends, and cost
analysis—and as sensor capabilities expand and
costs decline, more use cases will be discovered.
Access to accurate, timely data helps managers
make decisions confidently and set strategies
based on science, not hunches or anecdotes.
Reaching this level of sophistication requires
the ability to aggregate large amounts of data.
Cloud deployment is a necessity for practical,
economical storage of vast data.
3
 5
Focus on co-innovation and
co-creation with partners
Cooperating with partners on new products and
services is becoming increasingly important in the
food and beverage industry as consumer trends
evolve and concepts like farm-to-table, ready-to-
make, and meal-clubs (which ship ingredients and
recipes to your door) gain in popularity. These
types of experiences often involve innovations
in packaging, e-commerce, and the ability for
consumers to make personalized choices based
on diet restrictions, number of servings, taste
preferences, or preparation abilities.
Blended business models often mean a crossover
of two niche specialties. For instance, take-home-
and-bake pizza merges “carry-out” and “frozen”
food for a product that stresses conveniences,
value, and family mealtime. Vending machines
and self-serve stations—which offer anything from
flavor-personalized cappuccino to mix-and-match 6
ice cream dots—combine food and technology.
By thinking beyond traditional delivery Create cross-functional teams to
mechanisms, companies can start to see how execute ideas
co-innovation can transform the business.
Your IT team can’t plan and execute a complete
digital agenda alone. The mandates must come
from the top, and continue to have key executives
highly engaged—especially in setting the
company culture, pace of change, risk tolerance,
and investment priorities. Teams can focus on
specific aspects, such as creating new revenue
streams, regulation compliance, commercializing
data, and enhancing existing systems. Teams
should involve personnel from multiple areas
and diverse backgrounds in order to get a
comprehensive perspective and a wide range
of new ideas. As teams focus on their specific
aspects, there must also be a method for teams
to share ideas, ensure their ideas are compatible
with other teams, and iron out any disagreements.

Food & Beverage Industry Checklist 4

How digital transformation will change manufacturing
Studies show that companies are embracing digital manufacturing in a big way:

$1.5 trillion 64.4%

of process manufacturers use
potential value to global economy
analytics in production or pilot project

50% + 50%
of food manufacturers use of f&b companies will buy new
customized equipment processing equipment for compliance

75% 4 out of 5
of food manufacturers plan to companies have more than
purchase new packaging equipment 100 product SKUs

Food & Beverage Industry Checklist 5

 7 8
Expand service offerings and
customer engagement
One of the main benefits of a digital strategy
is the opportunity it offers you to better align
with your customers. An enhanced customer
experience provides a valuable way to
differentiate your company from competitors.
Aligning with customers can be as simple as
creating product labels that provide easy-to-
read, detailed information about ingredients,
serving size, and a variety of factors from gluten-
free to non-GMO. Distributors, big-box retailers,
convenience stores, and restaurants also have
specialized expectations concerning packaging
and preparation. These value-add details may
be far removed the actual taste of the product,
yet may make the difference between booming
sales growth and slow movement off the shelves.
Staying current with trends requires flexible
systems, including agile software solutions that let
you adapt as your market landscape evolves.
Food & Beverage Industry Checklist
Enhance the supply chain and
connected networks
Visibility to the extended supply chain is more
critical now than ever. As companies turn
to inventory management as a strategy for
controlling costs and minimizing waste, managing
the just-in-time delivery of ingredients and
resources is critical. In this global economy,
suppliers can be scattered across continents.
Delivery can be delayed by weather, capacity
constraints, or seasonal fluctuations. Despite
all of this, manufacturers must keep the
operations running smoothly and fulfill customer
orders as promised. This means an integrated
choreography of decisions based on real-time
data collected from suppliers.
Sensors and the Internet of Things (IoT) are
dramatically increasing the ability to monitor and
manage the supply chain. Sensors can be used
to monitor conditions within shipping containers,
such as temperature and humidity. Data collected
can automatically trigger adjustments, such as
turning on fans or misters. This is extremely
valuable in industries such as food and beverage,
where temperature must be controlled for safety
and freshness.
Sensors can also be used to track exact locations
using GPS and satellites. This helps managers
divert shipments around adverse weather
conditions and plan backup options when
needed. There’s never a time when you should
have to guess as to when a shipment will arrive.
6
 9
Keep equipment running
Ensuring critical equipment is operational is one of the most fundamental use cases of digital
technologies, and one that offers tremendous value. Manufacturers can install smart sensors in their
internal machinery and equipment. The sensors can monitor and communicate a wide variety of
conditions, such as speed, temperature, vibration, volume, weight, and mass. This data is collected,
aggregated, and analyzed for anomalies that may signal an imminent machine failure or need for service.
Early symptoms of malfunction, like overheating or excessive vibration, trigger an automated response.
This response can range from a notice sent to the head of maintenance, an alarm sounding, a technician
being dispatched, maintenance being scheduled, a replacement part being pulled out of inventory, or
in the case of a serious safety breach, the line shutting down. This preemptive ability to spot equipment
issues before they cause an unplanned shut down is of tremendous value. It allows you to extend the
lifecycle of mission critical equipment, protect your investment, and schedule maintenance when it will
least impact fulfilling customer orders.

Learn more about deploying a digital

strategy in Constellation Research’s
“Nine Entry Points to Digital Transformation,”
or visit Infor.com.

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