- Lifecycle management software can save more than three weeks’ time and £125,000 in annual costs during product development process
- Clients report 2-4% reduction in material costs and 21-25% fall in product development costs by using advanced software
Food manufacturers can save more than three weeks of product development time by switching to more sophisticated software, according to new analysis of client data from a leading food tech firm.
Customers using Point74’s platform are bringing products to market two to three weeks faster than before adopting its software.
Speeding up delivery is helping its client base, including Ginsters, Pilgrim’s UK and Charlie Bigham’s, to populate supermarket shelves quicker and keep up with consumer demands.
That client data shows significant timesaving on product development, largely thanks to Point74’s technology cutting basic sample submission time from three hours to just 30 minutes.
The integrated platform, Point74’s Food Lifecycle Management (FLM) system, achieves this by bringing recipe design, supplier data, raw material specifications, cost modelling and regulatory compliance into one system, so technical teams can move from concept to shelf without switching between spreadsheets and separate tools.
Alongside the quicker turnaround, Point74’s client data shows a 2-4% reduction in material costs and a 21-25% fall in overall product development costs, saving a typical food developer around £125,000 a year.
The same client data highlights similar gains across finance, technical and product teams: recipe review and optimisation have delivered annual raw material savings in excess of £250,000 for one manufacturer, alongside fewer failed product trials and lower allergen-related costs for others.
Across its client base, Point74 manages more than £15bn of retail product value and supports an average of 4,116 new product launches each year.
“Every week a new product spends stuck in admin is a week it isn’t on shelf,” said Rob Sinclair, CEO of Point74.
“Manufacturers are under enormous pressure on margins right now, and most of them are still losing time to processes that have nothing to do with the product itself: chasing data between systems, re-entering the same information twice, and waiting on a spreadsheet to catch up.
“The need for optimisation has been building for years. Retailer lead times are shrinking. Labelling and nutrition regulations are tightening. Consumer expectations around ingredients and provenance are rising.
“Cutting a sample submission from three hours to 30 minutes doesn’t sound dramatic on its own but multiply that across every product in development and it changes what a technical team can achieve in a single year.”
Point74’s platform is used across the UK food and drink sector to manage the full new product development process, from recipe formulation and costing through to compliance and retailer submission. The company works with food and drink manufacturers and retailers across the UK, including some of the country’s largest grocery and chilled food businesses.
Point74 is offering manufacturers a demonstration of its platform throughout the summer. Details are available at www.point74.co.uk.
