Guac

I’m excited to share that Guac will be featured in Groceryshop’s Store of Tomorrow! In a mock grocery store within the conference floor, we’ll be showcasing our AI-powered demand forecasting and replenishment solution, alongside 7 other selected solutions: Instacart (Caper Carts + FoodStorm), Walmart Commerce Technologies, Tesco, Brain Corp, Diebold Nixdorf, and GS1. If you’ll be at Groceryshop and want to see how we use NFL games to predict avocado sales, come check us out at the Store of Tomorrow!?

?? Our Co-Founder & CEO?Euro Wang recently sat down with?Lynn Petrak?and?Progressive Grocer?for an interview! “Accurate forecasting is not just about using the best machine learning models, but it’s about how to capture the real world things that affect demand,” said Euro Wang. “If the model doesn’t know that there’s a Taylor Swift concert in the area?next Tuesday, it won’t be able to capture the demand that’s affected by it.” Check out the article to learn more about?Guac's origin story, our ‘secret sauce’, and how we’re using Spotify data (and much more!) to predict future grocery demand! #GroceryTech?#GroceryRetail?#AI https://lnkd.in/enKB-H8U

Predicting future demand… Guac CEO Euro Wang shares the secret behind how his startup is taking forecasting to a whole new level of accuracy: https://ow.ly/P5Fl50Qnz90 #grocerytech #foodretail #grocery

Ever wondered why your favorite guacamole is sometimes unavailable at the local supermarket? Y?Combinator backed, Guac, founded by entrepreneurs Euro Wang and Jack Solomon, addresses the crux of the issue — poor grocery demand forecasting. In the U.S., where 10% of the 44 billion pounds of annual food production goes to waste, the consequences are not just environmental but also impact retailers, causing up to 8% revenue loss due to inadequate inventory availability. Guac utilizes AI to predict daily per-item sales for grocers, combating the challenges posed by climate-induced supply shortages, inflation, and rising labor costs. The platform, recently securing $2.3 million in a seed round led by 1984 Ventures, offers transparency and fine-tuned forecasting models. Unlike traditional methods, Guac factors in variables like weather, sporting events, betting odds, and even Spotify listening data to optimize inventory orders. Wang emphasizes Guac's dedication to transparency, stating, "Our machine learning model isn't a black box — we tell our customers why demand changes." Early customers, including a supermarket chain with 300 locations, attest to Guac's value, generating revenue and aiming to expand its engineering team. As Euro Wang aptly puts it, "The grocery industry is fairly resistant to economic downturns," making Guac's innovative solution a timely boon for a sector integral to our daily lives. #Guac #AI #FoodWaste #Retail #TechForGood #SustainableRetail

The final FoodTech funding rounds of 2023 ?? Apax?closed its Apax Global Impact Fund with?$900 million?to support mission-driven companies tackling critical environmental or social issues. ?? Ag biotech NewLeaf Symbiotics, Inc., secured $45 million?in a Series D funding round led by?Gullsp?ng Re:food?to further develop its pink-pigmented facultative methylotroph technology for use in biologicals for row crops. ?? US-based VC?Springdale Ventures?closed its Fund II with $40 million?to support early-stage consumer brands across the food, beverage, pet, health, and beauty sectors. ?? A consortium led by Finnish startup?Solar Foods?has been?awarded €5.5 million?from the?European Innovation Council Pathfinder?program to fund HYDROCOW, a project aiming to use precision fermentation to produce whey protein from microbes fed with carbon dioxide and hydrogen instead of sugars. ???NutriLeads raised €4.5 million?in a Series C funding round led by existing investor?dsm-firmenich Venturing. It will use the funds to accelerate the commercialisation of its prebiotic ingredient, BeniCaros, made from upcycled carrot pomace. ?? US-based?Guac?secured $2.3 million seed funding, in a round led by?1984 Ventures, for its AI-powered platform which predicts how many items grocers will sell on a per-item basis each day at a given store location, helping to cut waste. ?????Brightseed?has been awarded its second grant from the?Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. ???? Future Cow Technologies?raised almost R$2 million?(approximately $410,000) in a funding round led by?Antler?and?Big Idea Ventures. ?? Libre Foods?received a €335,000 public R&D grant?from?Neotec, a program which supports technology-based companies. ???Munch, one of the largest food-saving apps in Central-Eastern Europe,?closed its Series A funding round.

Massive congratulations to Shared Future Fund portfolio company Guac ?? on their $2.3M seed round covered by TechCrunch! Fresh off the heels of this announcement, we sat down with Euro Wang and Jack Solomon to chat more about how their AI algorithm accurately predicts future sales for grocery retailers, and why they personally became so interested in decarbonizing the grocery industry. Head over to the blog to read more: https://lnkd.in/daiCe4GP

Guac (YC S23) has raised a $2.3M seed round to solve grocery food waste. U.S. grocery stores discard about 10% of the country's annual food production, which amounts to approximately 44 billion pounds. This practice is not only environmentally detrimental, as food waste significantly contributes to carbon emissions, but it also results in financial losses for grocery retailers. According to Retail Insights, food and grocery stores can lose up to 8% of their revenue due to insufficient inventory management. Inspired to attempt tackling the problem with tech, Euro Wang and Jack Solomon co-founded Guac — a platform that uses AI to accurately predict future sales for grocery retailers, helping them reduce food waste and increase availability. The team builds custom algorithms designed to predict the quantities of grocery items that need to be ordered. These algorithms consider factors like weather conditions, sports events, betting odds, and even Spotify listening trends, to accurately gauge consumer buying patterns. This translates into tailored recommendations that encompass aspects such as product shelf life, minimum order quantities, promotional offers, and supplier lead times —?all of which are seamlessly integrated into the customers' existing inventory ordering systems and processes. Currently, Guac is working with retailers and grocery delivery companies in North America, Europe, and the Middle East, including a supermarket chain with 300 locations. The company is already generating revenue, and anticipates further expansion in 2024. Congrats to the team on the round!

?? We’re excited to share that Guac has raised $2.3M to solve grocery food waste! Our AI algorithm predicts exactly how many items grocery retailers will sell in the future, helping them reduce food waste and increase availability. Food waste is a huge cost to grocers’ bottom lines, but also to our planet. What excites us the most is that we have an incredibly unique opportunity to align positive social impact with profit growth for the enormous grocery industry. We’re grateful to partner with 1984 Ventures, who led our round, with participation from Y Combinator, Collaborative Fund, and angels from Instacart, Roblox, Jane Street, Citadel Securities, and more. Today, retailers are reducing their food waste by 33% with Guac. With this investment round, we’re excited to accelerate our mission of solving grocery food waste. If you’re at a grocery retailer or know anyone who is, we’d love to show you how we can help your demand forecasting systems! https://lnkd.in/e5zp8Nem

The traditional tool of choice for grocery demand forecasting is often Excel — managers will apply simple Excel formulas on historical sales data to calculate how much they’ll sell in the future. So, for this blog post, we decided to put our algorithm to the test against Excel: a *bake-off* between an Excel formula that one of our customers previously used vs. Guac's ML algorithm. Along the way, we explain why grocery demand is impossible to predict with Excel, and how we're better — by combining machine learning technology with external data sets. https://lnkd.in/d297g9Hp