Bringing AI into food innovation: Digital tech must provide accessibility and meaning to consumers

Danone has invested a great deal into the use of digital health technologies to both screen and promote healthier eating behaviours in consumers, in the hopes of aggregating the data required to provide personalised solutions to all.

“Throughout these initiatives, we have realised that digital innovation must be about human needs to solve these human problems, and that the devices we use to collect this data must in fact mean something to our target consumers in order to get them to make use of these, and thus help us access the data we require,”​ Danone Senior Team Leader for Digital Health Jill Wong told FoodNavigator-Asia​ as part of our latest FNA InnovATE video, speaking to us after the Growth Asia Summit 2024.

“Without having them really understand what the end game is and how this data collection can benefit them, it can be very difficult to collect long-term data by which we can cultivate and grow the AI to generate the right solutions.​

“For example, in a country like Bangladesh where many young consumers have iron deficiencies and we want to screen and support them early, it can be difficult to do so even when providing the parents with the most expensive and high-tech of devices if these are expensive and hard to deploy, e.g. high tech sensors might be thrown away after a while if these get in the way of their daily life.​

“What we need to do is to collect data the right way so as to fuel the right future innovations, and the most crucial aspect is that the tech used to do this must be readily available and at their fingertips for them to use it regularly.​

“This can include things like smartwatches or phones, which can integrate into their daily lives, gather and bundle the required data, then be used with our AI to personalise diets and products according to their needs.”​

When enough data is aggregated, it is only then that the advancement of digital health technologies and AI can take place to see what is needed in a community and link these back to products that fit local human needs.

“There are still many challenges in the way of this, so we must be aware of ​the potential and risks they might pose,”​ she added.

“The best way forward is for regulators, tech developers, consumers, healthcare professionals and so on to align on what is right and can be done regarding things such as data privacy, data governance, accuracy, credibility, just to name a few. ​

“Digital and data transformation is about connection, to succeed we need to bring our digital initiatives together and collaborate – If we can come to a partnership, an alignment, we can win together.”​

Watch the video above to find out more.