Concept: New York’s startup Turing Labs has rolled out a software as a service (SaaS) platform that assists enterprises with consumer packaged goods (CPG) formulations. It leverages AI to help with product formulations, reformulations, and innovation for all CPG formulated goods including food, cosmetics, personal care, and cleaning products.

Nature of Disruption: Turing enables R&D and product development to merge data from several systems that are often disparate and incompatible into a single platform. It can optimize, streamline, and intelligently lead the development of CPG. Before new prospective formulations are produced, the platform can be utilized to generate reliable predictions. This eliminates the need for time-consuming and expensive physical synthesis and testing. Its AI learns from product development and collaborates directly with them, using algorithms created specifically for CPG manufacturers and suppliers. The platform can then suggest appropriate formulations, significantly reducing the time from concept to production  compared to the traditional trial-and-error method. Companies can use the platform to collaborate and co-create throughout all stages of product development from one platform. They can develop better prototypes faster by leveraging Turing’s AI to identify novel insights and combinations previously hidden in siloed data.

Outlook: Due to constantly changing customer preferences including ingredient inputs, and the growth of competitive independent brands, CPG companies are under pressure to develop new goods faster and update their present portfolio. The biggest challenge that the CPG sector face is that the products must be reformulated and reinvented regularly to satisfy changing consumer demand. To comply with health and wellness trends, supply chain constraints, and ongoing pressure to boost profitability, CPG firms are spending too much time, money, and resources on inefficient manual processes. Addressing these issues, Turing Labs automates the formulation process and predicts results to help CPG companies bring new products to market faster. It uses a combination of data and current knowledge to create feasible MVPs (minimum viable product) of formulas that are optimized to gain customers and increase margins. In January 2022, the startup  raised  $16.5M in a Series A funding round led by Insight Partners, with participation from investors including Moment Ventures and Y Combinator. It intends to use the funds to speed up R&D, grow the engineering team, expand operations, and further develop a go-to-market organization.

This article was originally published in Verdict.co.uk