AI’ll have what she’s having

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Hello reader,

As someone who works remotely, I spend a lot of time in cafes.

Despite Hanoi having an overabundance of coffee houses, the last couple of months I’ve been hitting the same spot over and over again. In fact, the staff don’t even take my order anymore – they know what drink to bring me when I arrive.

The first time this happened, I pouted, said no to my normal black tea, and asked for a menu. After five minutes poring over it, I sheepishly went with my usual order, much to the staff’s delight.

I guess I’m not the most adventurous when it comes to food and drink. I like what I like and tend to stick with that.

F&B companies put a lot of blood, sweat, and tears (not literally, ew) into coming up with new products to expand our taste buds with. Singapore-based Ai Palette is betting its AI-powered solution can help them do that a lot more efficiently.

Today we look at:

• The AI-powered platform devising new flavors for FMCG brands
• Grab’s push for profit by focusing on affordable services
• Other newsy highlights such as Indian edtech startup GradRight raising US$6.1 million and two GoTo Group directors snapping up more than 1 billion shares.

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Generative flavor

Image credit: Timmy Loen

Ai Palette recently helped Pringles come up with two new flavors. The snack company is one of several big FMCG names that have used the Singapore-based SaaS firm’s services to roll out new offerings.

One of Ai Palette’s latest tools is Concept Genie, which helps FMCG firms cut the time needed to create new products from six months to 15 minutes, says co-founder and CEO Somsubhra GanChoudhuri.

• Safety first: Due to the investment needed to launch a new product, FMCG firms are at pains to reduce risk as much as possible, GanChoudhuri tells Tech in Asia. Through generative AI, Ai Palette is able to identify new consumer trends using more than 61 billion data points.
• Staying ahead of the curve: These trends, whether long-term or short-term, tend to follow a bell-shaped curve, according to GanChoudhuri. If FMCG companies can figure out where a certain food or drink trend is going, they can adapt accordingly.
• Going native: Ai Palette is also launching FoodGPT, which it says will be the biggest large language model in the F&B industry. The tool will be able to operate in 16 different languages, something GanChoudhuri sees as crucial to its success, as food and beverage consumption is driven by local preferences.

Grab’s profit drive

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