bioMérieux and Mérieux NutriSciences partner with key food industry players to launch a new collaborative data-driven model

Marcy-l’Étoile, France and Chicago, US, April 5^th, 2024 – bioMérieux, a world leader in the field of in vitro diagnostics, and Mérieux NutriSciences, a world leader in food safety, quality, and sustainability, jointly announce the launch of a new data-driven Trusted Third Party initiative, built with a group of global food industry partners to foster safe industry collaboration as well as better anticipate and prevent food safety risks.

Despite strong efforts, the food industry continues to cope with numerous safety and quality issues leading to public health threats, recalls and operational impacts. Changing the status quo and enhancing food safety control systems necessitates looking beyond the current systems based primarily on auditing, certification and testing. This is why, as leaders in food safety and quality, bioMérieux and Mérieux NutriSciences are committed to tirelessly exploring new ways of pushing existing boundaries in safeguarding public health.

Together with some of the largest global food industry players, bioMérieux and Mérieux NutriSciences have developed an innovative and collaborative model where both companies jointly act as a Trusted Third Party.

Based on meaningful business questions identified by all food partners, data is confidentially and securely aggregated from all participating partners and is combined with other publicly-available data of interest (commodity pricing, food safety events, weather, etc.). The objective is to deliver consolidated anonymous insights and support business critical decision-making, strengthening partners’ food safety risk management programs and supply chain integrity while promoting competitiveness among industry players to reach higher quality and safety standards.

Whilst the model currently focuses on Supplier Risk Management as the initial priority, it will serve multiple additional applications in the near future.

“At bioMérieux, we are excited about the innovative collaboration with Mérieux NutriSciences and our food industry partners. With a shared purpose and by combining our expertise, resources and data, our intent is to reshape the landscape of food safety, and set augmented quality standards.” explained Yasha Mitrotti, Executive Vice President, Industrial Applications, bioMérieux.

Nicolas Cartier, Mérieux NutriSciences CEO, commented: “I am proud that, together with bioMérieux, the trust our food industry partners have in our companies has resulted in the development of this innovative model, allowing us to harness the power of our collective data – not only for the benefit of our companies’ individual objectives, but for the planet as we take leaps to help make food systems safer, healthier, and more sustainable.”

Barry Callebaut, Danone, Mars, Mondelēz International, Nestlé and PepsiCo have been involved as early partners in the exploration and design of the model over the last two years. Each company shared initial data sets to build the proof of concept and evaluate potential interest, helped identify key business questions and food safety issues, contributed to the platform design, and now supports the model development and expansion. This collaboration provides full confidence in delivering tangible and sustainable value for all partners.

bioMérieux and Mérieux NutriSciences are now ready to welcome additional members with the ambition of maximizing scalability of this model within the next months to accelerate value creation for the food industry and improve overall consumer safety.