This year’s Future of Freight Festival takes place Nov. 19-21 in Chattanooga, Tennessee. But it’s not your average conference. Sure, there are wonderful speakers and fireside chats. But the real fun stuff starts after that. F3 is set up with half-days of speakers and amazing content. The other half we take over downtown Chattanooga, and there are events, networking and a lot of fun to be had by all. This year, subscribers to Running on Ice get a promo code exclusive to us! You can register with this link or use the code F3ROI24 at checkout for a discount.
All thawed out
Port Houston made some chilling announcements this week. It is officially approved to receive and manage shipments for the cold treatment process. This process is crucial for the import of fresh produce as the cold not only maintains the freshness of the produce but also prevents the introduction of pests into the U.S.
“As an established importer and distributor of fresh produce in Houston, having cold treatment services in this region is imperative to broaden access to key commodities and sustainable growth,” said Jacquie Ediger, executive vice president of Pro Citrus Network.
Port Houston is one of the nation’s largest ports, handles 73% of U.S. Gulf Coast container traffic and is the second-ranked U.S. port in terms of total foreign cargo, with a value of $240.1 billion per year. The introduction of cold treatment will make Houston a strong contender for a hub of cold chain.
Temperature checks
It was a big week for cold chain giant Lineage Logistics. It announced the pricing of its initial public offering, a value of roughly $19 billion. Proceeds from the offering are expected to bring in $3.4 billion to $3.9 billion, which will be used to repay debt, fund cash grants to employees and pay transaction expenses.
According to Todd Maiden’s article, “The offering includes 47 million shares of common stock and a customary 30-day, 15% option (an additional 7.05 million shares) to deal underwriters. The company’s stock will be listed on the Nasdaq under the ticker “LINE.” The price range was set at $70 to $82 per share.”
Lineage, as of now, will hold the title for the largest IPO of 2024. That’s across all industries. The previous title holder was the cruise-line Viking Holdings, which raised $1.5 billion in its May IPO. Viking was valued at $10.36 billion.
Food and drug
Food freshness and shelf life preservation are among the most important components of the food supply chain. In the U.S. alone, food waste takes 30%-40% of the food supply. In an attempt to decrease that number, Evigence has come up with a unique solution to combat that problem through the development of FreshSense.
FreshSense is a freshness management platform that has new sensors patented with chemistry-enabled QR codes. This new tech has the following benefits and more.
- Easy-to-understand visual representations of freshness status of all scanned products with immediate identification of both the problematic and freshest products.
- Heat map visualizations of cases and days left of real remaining shelf life.
- Alerts on potential impacts from varying conditions across different regions and seasons or unexpected disruptions, such as power outages or extreme weather.
- Comprehensive overviews of scanning compliance to support adherence to protocols.
“Our technology will eventually be the death of the date code as we aim to optimize freshness throughout supply chains, inventory, retail and even in consumers’ homes. Date codes are terribly inaccurate indicators of food freshness and product quality, leading to tremendous inefficiencies throughout the food industry supply chain,” noted Evigence co-founder and CEO Yoav Levy.
Cold chain lanes
This week’s SONAR market goes to Southern California, the home of the Ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach. Reefer outbound tender rejections are on the rise again after plummeting for the Fourth of July. The ROTRI at 12.43% is high, indicating that spot rates are elevated in this market, especially given that reefer outbound tender volumes are on the decline. Spot rates should be elevated compared to the previous week, but rates should match levels at the beginning of the month that were leading into the holiday.
If reefer outbound tender volumes increase and remain elevated at the end of July, it could be a sign that the market is beginning to turn as summer wraps up and we head into the fall and retail peak season.
Is SONAR for you? Check it out with a demo!
Shelf life
Meet the American who cooked up frozen foods, adventurer and innovator Clarence Birdseye
A gel for storing protein therapeutic
Mexico’s Femsa offloads refrigeration, food service operations
FedEx opens first European life science center in Veldhoven
Wanna chat in the cooler? Shoot me an email with comments, questions or story ideas at moconnell@freightwaves.com.
See you on the internet.
Mary
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