It’s August, so naturally it’s time to start thinking about the SXSW Festival in March of next year. No, really, you actually should; the conference is running its “Panel Picker” right now, so if there is a particular topic you want to see discussed on stage, now is the time to let your voice be heard.
And because we at The Spoon are all about saving you time, we’ve pulled together a list of all the food tech panels we could find on the SXSW site (these are in no way an endorsement of any particular panel). Read through the partial panel descriptions (taken from the SXSW site) below and click on the links to vote up the ones you want to see.
Are We Ready for Cellular Ag?
This panel of cell ag experts and bioengineers will explore what it will take to get cell-based meat out of the lab and into the grocery store. How do we harness the potential of this revolutionary technology in a way that is sustainable and profitable?
Speakers:
Brittany Solano, Vice President, JDI
Juan Francisco Llamazares, CEO and Founder, Stamm Bio
Ahmed Khan, Founder & Editor, CellAgri
Ka Yi Ling, Chief Science Officer & Co-Founder, Shiok Meats
Turning Over A New Leaf- How Data Helps SweetGreen
In 2020 the demand from consumers for food provenance and sustainability credentials will be overwhelming. From supermarkets, to restaurants, farmer stalls and food halls, If I can’t track its origins, can I trust it?
Speakers:
Julie Vargas, Head of RFID Food Solutions, Avery Dennison
Kevin Quandt, Vice President of supply chain & sustainability, Sweet Green
Autonomous Vehicle, Going Beyond Drive — AI Farming
The Future of AI Farming, The AI will grow your food in the future. We strive to be for AI farming what HTML was for developing the internet. GenZ generation slowly disconnects from farmlands, Using AI technologies & Aeroponics which has the ability to grow crops, plants and healthy food. We view changing climate, limited resources, growing populations, and rapid urbanization coupled with advances in technology, Mobility & energy as an exciting opportunity for auto & agritech innovation.
Speaker:
pinaki laskar, CEO & Founder, fisheyebox
Delivering the Future of Commerce, Autonomously
The last mile is the final step from retailer to consumer, and a virtual battlefield for companies that offer delivery services. With 70% of consumers expected to purchase food and beverages online by 2024, the last-mile stakes are especially high for grocery retailers. Hear how the largest food retailer in the U.S. and a startup run by former Google engineers are changing the future of last-mile logistics with the world’s first fleet of fully autonomous, on-road vehicles.
Speakers:
Yael Cosset, Chief Information Officer, The Kroger Co. (Fortune 20 Company)
Dave Ferguson, Co-Founder & President, Nuro
AI, IoT, ML, Blockchain, for Purpose & Profit
Doing good business is good business. Now, intelligent technologies can help companies do both faster, more effectively, and more efficiently, no matter the industry. Join us to discuss how technologists, visionaries, businesses, and brands are leveraging AI, IoT, ML, blockchain, analytics to reduce and manage waste including carbon and plastics, to provide renewable energy while protecting investors, to increase crop production and reduce food waste, to protect food supply and therefore consumers, to ensure healthy lives and improve well-being for all, at all ages, and to build safe and smart cities and economies, end to end, all across this big blue marble that we all share, that is our shared responsibility.
Speakers:
Padmini Ranganathan, Global Vice President, Risk and Sustainability Solutions, SAP
James Sullivan, Head, Global Sustainability Innovation Accelerator, SAP
Stephen Jamieson, Head of Sustainable Business Innovation, EMEA N, SAP
New Year, New Meat: Growing Steak Without Cows!
In 2050, meat demand will increase by 70%, a rate that our planet can’t presently sustain using current agriculture methods. We simply don’t have the resources to produce meat at that supply. But what if there was a way to produce meat that meets the demand, and that uses 99% less land, 96% less water and produces 96% less greenhouse gas?
Speaker:
Isabella Grandic, Innovator, The Knowledge Society
Can Virtual Kitchens Deliver Real Connections?
Join our experts to discuss the future of restaurants in a mobile world: What happens to the connections provided by a shared dining experience? Restaurants have spent millions to create their brand: food, atmosphere, community, people. What do we lose—or gain—in the name of convenience?
Speakers:
Alex Canter, CEO and Co-Founder, Ordermark
Meredith Sandland, Chief Operating Officer, Kitchen United
Fred LeFranc, CEO, Chaos Strategist, Results Thru Strategy
Fulfillment in the City of the Future
Every city is driving towards the same universal innovation, but each city’s path will look different. While we can highlight some major shifts in future cities, there is no one-size-fits all solution to future-proofing. Every city will evolve differently, and the future approach to fulfillment should flex to meet these needs. As a tool to imagine future city landscapes – including challenges, cultural and legal shifts, and changes to the food system – Relish Works will explore five model cities, which take future city findings and fulfillment solutions to the extreme.
Speaker:
Mandy Tahvonen, Managing Director, Relish Works
Delivery + Tech: What it Means for the Future
Off-premise sales totaled $279B in 2018, and that’s expected to grow to $402B by 2022. Convenience and technology are converging to meet the needs of consumers outside the four walls of the traditional restaurant begging the question “what does the restaurant landscape look like in 10 years?” Behind the scenes is a network of integrated technology (apps, web ordering) and new business models (virtual restaurants like Kitchen United, coming soon to Austin) enabling food to be brought to people wherever they are, changing the restaurant model as we know it.
Speakers:
Jim Collins, Founder, CEO, Kitchen United
Padma Rao, Senior Vice President of Strategic Projects, GrubHub
Alex Canter, Founder, CEO, Ordermark
David Meiselman, Chief Marketing Officer, ezCater
Your Best Next Diet- Customized for Your DNA
The Keto Diet works for some, not for others. A vegan diet works for some, not for others. Why? And how do you know what diet is best for YOU? Nutrigenomics is the next opportunity in the $60 billion diet industry and the best opportunity to fuel your best life for the future. Using your genetic information, nutrigenomics is already providing answers to the question, “What diet is best for me?” by providing customized eating plans for your DNA, blood type, and the way your body processes certain foods. And we have only scratched the surface. This panel will look at nutrigenomics from the points of view of a scientist, an investor, a consumer who needs this research for health, and a healthcare professional.
Speakers:
Mike Carr, Founder, The Consistency Initiative
Alpha Germain, North America Inclusion & Diversity Specialist, Accenture
Rob Lyles, President, Cook Regentec
The Future of Cravings: AI’s Impact on Dinner
Every day, people around the world face the same dilemma: What are they going to eat? We spend hours scanning recipe sites for inspiration but there are many tedious tasks between that and actually having a meal. Do you have the ingredients? Does your local market stock what you need or an easy substitution? In an increasingly connected world, and where your smart home knows everything about you through connected devices, dinnertime doesn’t need to be so hard. Imagine if your fridge could suggest how to use zucchini, if your toilet informed AI how to make you healthier, and your phone automatically added the ingredients to your Instacart list. Learn about the future of food in which we waste less, eat healthier and make the journey from meal inspiration to the dinner table seamless.
Speaker:
Nick Holzherr, Head of Whisk, Samsung NEXT
Augmented Reality and Food: The Future of Dining
It’s time to tackle the 100-year old problem facing restaurants and dining: why are beautifully crafted dishes reduced to just a few typed words on a menu? This panel discusses the recent breakthroughs in Augmented Reality that allow for the stunning recreation of dishes in AR, research we’ve conducted with the Universities of Oxford, New Castle and New South Wales on craveability through this new medium, and the implications these findings will have on the future of dining.
Speakers:
Matt Maher, President, M7 Innovations
Dr. Rhonda Hadi, Associate Professor of Marketing at University of Oxford, University at Oxford
Alper Guler, CSO and Co-Founder of QReal, QReal
Scott Nelson, Vice President, Panera
Cultivating Food, Jobs & Inclusivity with AgTech
A more inclusive farming future is already here, with technology modernizing the world’s oldest industry to be accessible to diverse populations. This session explores how agtech can cultivate more than food to drive skilled employment, therapeutic environments, and actionable pathways to create meaningful connections between people, food, and technology. Panelists will discuss their work equipping adults with special needs and autism with successful and community-enriching careers in agtech using tools as advanced as they are approachable. They’ll also share how veterans are using the technology to reintegrate into the workforce – all while supplying healthy, hyper-local produce to the surrounding community through a decentralized supply chain.
Speakers:
Don Tobul, Owner and Operator, OD Greens LLC
Danielle Nierenberg, Co-Founder & President of Food Tank; Host of the “Food Talk with Dani Nierenberg” podcast, Food Tank
Zach Zepf, Co-Founder, Zeponic Farms
Jon Friedman, Co-founder and COO, Freight Farms
Accelerating the Future of Food
This session will bring leadership of The Food Foundry (a food industry focused accelerator program in Chicago) together with three of our successful start-up companies to talk about the future of food. Specifically we will address the areas that are primed for opportunity (local food access, new/leaner distribution approaches, how restaurants are evolving, etc.) and what roles start-ups, investors, and corporate partners have in driving this change. We’ll focus specifically on how deliberately combining resources of an experienced corporate entity, funding capital, and a human-centered design approach creates a new paradigm for working with start-ups to drive this change.
Speakers:
Nicholas Florek, Director of The Food Foundry, Relish Works, Inc
Sam Eder, Co-Founder and CEO, Big Wheelbarrow
Larissa Russell, CEO and CoFounder, Pod Foods
Anna Haas, Co-Founder and COO, Local Food Connection
Hungry for More: Solving the US Food-Waste Paradox
There’s a fundamental absurdity in our food system. Today, 40% of the food produced in the U.S. is thrown away, yet 1 in 8 Americans struggles with hunger. Redirecting even 1/3 of this food would help feed everyone in need. This critical food-waste paradox won’t be solved by one individual, one company or one idea – it requires the innovation and speed of startups and the infrastructure and influence of big companies.
Speakers:
Jessica Adelman, Group Vice President, Corporate Affairs and Chief Impact Officer, The Kroger Co., Fortune 20 Company
Emily Ma, Lead, Food Systems, X, the moonshot company (Formerly Google X)
The Future of Food: AgTech for Consumers & Farmers
The average American farm has become almost twice as large and productive as it was in the 1960s, an accomplishment due in large part to developments made in agriculture and technology — a.k.a. AgTech. However, from the implementation of rural broadband access for farmers to consumer acceptance of AgTech, there remains much progress to be made before we can reap the fruits (and vegetables and livestock!) of technological labor. What will it take for new advances in IoT, automation, satellites, biotech, and drone technology to be successfully adopted by countries around the world? Our panel of thought leaders in AgTech law, data, banking, and AI will discuss the steps necessary for a global transformation of food production, management, and distribution.
Speakers:
Roger Royse, Founder, Royse Law Firm & Royse AgTech Innovation Network
Billy Tiller, Co-Founder and CEO, Grower Information Services Cooperative (GiSC)
Adam Bergman, Senior Vice President of CleanTech Banking & Head of AgTech Practice, Wells Fargo
Food Delivery is Changing Where and How we Eat
Delivery isn’t just for pizza anymore. Food delivery services like Uber Eats, DoorDash and Seamless are rising in popularity and it’s changing the way people think about what they can order and where they can eat. In this session, we will hear from industry leaders about the signals they are seeing and how they are adapting to meet the needs of consumers. Where is food delivery going from here?
Speakers:
Mike Chuthakieo, Industry Lead, Pinterest
David Bornoff, Head of Consumer Marketing, DoorDash
Why Food Waste is a Problem
The main cause of deforestation, species extinction, river pollution, water depletion, and a significant contributor to greenhouse gas emissions is food production. This session will explain these impacts, and how to not waste food.
Speaker:
Stephen Sturdivant, environmental engineer, US EPA
The Data-Driven Food System: From Soil to Supper
Google has convened the Refresh Working Group—40 farmers, nutritionists, retailers, researchers, and consumers—to collectively examine how AI is helping to improve the U.S. food system. Farmers today are using image recognition technologies to detect signs of bacteria or fungus—such as color change, wilting, or spots—to identify pests and plant diseases. Predictive ordering algorithms are modernizing food retail and helping to cut food waste in half. Natural language processing applications can read tweets and restaurant reviews in order to identify sources of food poisoning and improve food safety inspections. Panel will include experts from Google, Austin Food Policy Council & Food Tank to discuss technologies are transforming food production, distribution, and consumption.
Speakers:
Danielle Nierenberg, President, Food Tank
Joi Chevalier, Founder, The Cook’s Nook
Ali Lange, Senior Policy Analyst, Google
Blockchain: The Recipe For a Smarter Food Supply
Blockchain solutions enable transparency and consistency by securely sharing information across the food value chain. By acting on insights from this data, organizations can drive sales, save money, and better mitigate risk by enhancing food traceability, quality, and freshness. Join us to learn why blockchain is a unique solution and how it helps deliver safe, higher quality food and greater business value.
Speakers:
Linda Pawczuk, US Blockchain Leader and Principal, Deloitte Consulting LLP
Kyle Tanger, Sustainability Leader and Managing Director, Deloitte Consulting LLP
Space ->Farm ->Fork: Satellites & our Food Supply
Imagine a world where farmers are no longer incentivized to grow as much as possible, a misguided practice that leaves much of that production left to rot for lack of a buyer. Technology can help reduce this waste as digitized and other sophisticated crop forecasting will help inform farmers on how much to grow and when. But today, food is the least digitized supply chain. Per the US Dept of Agriculture, 29% of farms lack an internet connection altogether. How can continuous global connectivity help the agriculture industry and how do we achieve it?
Speakers:
Sara Spangelo, CEO, Swarm Technologies
Evan Thomas, CEO, Sweet Sense
Micki Seibel, Investor & Advisor, Ms.
Ag, Food, and Tech Must Merge Not Collide
The average farmer made negative $1549 last year. The average child will tell you his/her food comes from a grocery store. Tech is a tool that can help farmers and consumers see a better world–for both our diets and planet. The intersection of ag, food, and tech must merge, not collide. Farmers are innovators who are demanding new tools for technology on their farms to grow more with less. We must use data that is available today to help our farmers improve their efficiency, create custom systems to figure out how to grow more with less, and sustainably. We need to make sure our supply chain all works together to produce more with less, from farm to table.
Speaker:
Bobby Chacko, CEO, Ocean Spray
On The Chopping Block: Work in the Future of Food
Robots flip burgers. Self-driving trucks deliver food. Automated kiosks take our food orders. When machines do everything, what work is left for the rest of us? As AI & automation sweep through our workforce, food industry workers are next up on the chopping block. New technologies present an array of new opportunities and challenges for workers in the industry. Business models are emerging that take advantage of tech advancements and cultural shifts around dining. But new skills are need to make it work.
Speaker:
Desmond Dickerson, Futurist, Cognizant Consulting
Bugs and Kelp, the Future Foods Feeding Us in 2030
Cellular meat and bleeding plant patties may be all the rage right now, but bugs and seaweed just might be our best bet to substantially change the way we feed our population on a global scale. Alternative crops like kelp, algae and seaweed, and alternative livestock like farmed insects are both often overshadowed by flashier techno-food solutions with wild valuations, but both are nutritionally dense and resource efficient methods to grow food that can be deployed today, with historic and cultural roots worldwide.
Speakers:
Tom Philpott, Food and Agriculture correspondent, Mother Jones
Kerry Rupp, Partner, True Wealth Ventures
Mohammed Ashour, CEO, Aspire Food Group (consumer brand EXO)
Liz Koutsos, President, EnviroFlight
Feeding 2050 – Blockchain, Lab Meat, AI, Oh My!
Our food system is at a crossroads. As farmable land decreases with increased city development, water supplies dwindle from climate change, and population growth continues at a staggering rate, food industry leaders are struggling to develop a food source that is sustainable, nutritious, and safe. While these mounting pressures could lead to a global food crisis, today’s reality also has the potential to bring about a level of scientific discovery and advancement we have never before seen. This panel, featuring experts from the Institute of Food Technologists, the FDA, Beyond Meat and S2G Ventures, will discuss what a future food system would look like if we incorporated innovations like lab grown food, alternative proteins, upcycling, hydroponic farming, and AI.
Speakers:
Maria Velissariou, Chief Science and Technology Officer, Institute of Food Technologists
Seth Goldman, Executive Chairman of the Board, Beyond Meat
Frank Yiannas, Deputy Commissioner for Food Policy and Response, Food and Drug Administration (FDA)
Aaron Rudberg, Managing Dir, S2G Ventures
How Online Spaces Have Changed The Way We Eat
We’ve all seen it happen – you sit down for a meal with friends, the food is served, and then everyone stops to take a photo for social media. There’s no denying the power of sharing the experience of food and making it a social experience. How have online spaces – food finding and delivery apps, food blogs and Instagram accounts, etc. – changed the way we eat for better or worse? Are restaurants who are ignoring this trend preserving their dignity or destined to become dinosaurs? How is this trend affecting the divide between the food haves and have-nots, or the hungry and the stuffed? We will be having a spirited discussion with experts in the food space who have reached millions through their apps, social media accounts, and television to see what’s in store for our culinary future.
Speakers:
Shahed Amanullah, Founder, Zabihah
Eddie Lin, Founder, Deep End Dining
Flexitarians Can Save the Planet
Flexitarians can save the planet, but only if food makers defy expectations of what animal-free alternatives can be. Consumers care deeply about the welfare of animals and farming’s environmental impact, they also revere the cultural and sensory experience of eating. We can’t expect people to make a trade-off. No one knows this better than Jon McIntyre, a food scientist who spent his career developing ingredients that shape some of America’s most iconic foods and beverages (PepsiCo., Solae) and leading R&D at Indigo Ag. Jon will explain how food companies, chefs and innovators can capture the appetite of flexitarians by unraveling the secrets of food, changing our understanding of gastronomic creativity and making the food we eat more planet-friendly in the process.
Speaker:
Jon McIntyre, CEO, Motif Ingredients
