 From the Computer History Museum, in the heart of Silicon Valley, it's theCUBE. Covering Food IT, Fork to Farm, brought to you by Western Digital. Hey, welcome back to theCUBE. From the Food IT event, from Fork to Farm. Yep, you heard that right, Fork to Farm. I'm Lisa Martin, really excited to be joined by my next guests who are influencing the food chain with big data, cloud IoT and blockchain in some very, very interesting ways. We have Rob O'Reilly, senior member and technical staff of Analog Devices. Welcome. Thank you. And we have Rajah Ramachandran, the founder and CEO of Ripe IO. Welcome. Thank you, Lisa. So I made that joke about the Fork to Farm because we think so often how trendy it is from the table, from the mouth. And this has been a really interesting event for us to talk with so many different people and companies across the food chain that we often, I think, take for granted. So Rob wanted to kind of start with you. Analog Devices has been around for 50 years. You serve a lot of markets. So how is, and maybe kind of tell me sort of the genesis and I know you were involved in this, of Analog Devices evolving to start using cloud big data IoT in the food and agriculture space. What was the opportunity that you saw, the light bulb moment? It's an interesting story. We started with a piece of technology, a sensor that we could connect. I was looking for an app to apply because it was a full center to the cloud strategy I was working on. And through some conference attendees that I had met and from a fellow who's now our partner, we kind of put together a strategy of, well, we've got the sensor to the cloud. Where would we apply this? And we decided through a little bit of banter, tomatoes. And most of it was because in New England specifically, there's a lot of, there's 7,000 farms in Massachusetts. Wow. Not all of them produce tomatoes, but a lot of them do. So it was like having a test bed right in our backyard. And from that point, it's grown to what it is now. And I hear that you don't like tomatoes. I really don't like tomatoes. What about heirloom tomatoes? I don't like any tomatoes. Montserrat a little basil now? No, no, I don't mind pasta sauce so much, but that's just because it's all salt and sugar. But no, and I've managed to get through this entire project without anybody forcing me to eat a tomato. That's good, their respect. So I was joking earlier, we cover a lot of events across enterprise innovation. And we were at a Hadoop data works event a couple of weeks ago. And one of the guests was talking about big data and how it's influencing shipping and how shipping companies are leveraging big data to determine how often they should clean the ships and to remove barnacles, because it slows them down. So the funny thing that popped into my mind from that show is barnacles and big data, never thought that. Today, the wow factor for me, the internet of tomatoes. What is the internet of tomatoes? The problem statement when we started was, why do tomatoes taste like cardboard? He really doesn't like tomatoes. And in order to go dig into that was, let's collect data. So there's a variety of methods that we use to collect the data. We had to create all of this on our own. So we created our own apps for the phones, our own mashups for the web, our own gateways. We built our hardware, we 3D printed all the housings and two of us just went off and started to deploy so we could collect data. And the second half of it was, well, what is in the tomato and why does it taste the way it does? So we started doing some chemistry analysis. So a bunch of refractometers and other instruments so we can see what the sugar levels were, what the acid levels were. We infused ourselves into the Boston Tomato Contest, which they have annually. So we showed up, we look like the Rolling Stones. We showed up with cases of trap cases of equipment. It took us about 11 and a half hours to test 113, I think it was, tomatoes. And then we compared those to the chef's scorecards. And in the chef's scorecard, there wasn't just a taste profile. There was the looks and everything else. Well, I found a few markers between what the chef's profile said was a good tasting tomato and what the chemistry said. So a year later, we showed up with our optical solution and we managed to test 450 tomatoes. Wow. About 100 of those go to the slicing table. So we had information on 100 of them. We did the same thing. So it got to the point to where we at least had that reconciliation of what's the farm we're doing and how does it taste. And by bringing Rajah and his group in, we're bringing a lot more of other big data, if you will. Other weather data, aerial drone data, anything that we could find in a telematic range that would affect the processing or whatever of the tomato. So that, in a nutshell, is the internet of tomatoes. And is this something that, you know, being able to aggregate big data from a variety of sources, something that you're planning to then take to, I heard you earlier in the talk, talking about kind of at the relationship building stage. Is this a dialogue that you're having yet with farms? You mentioned 7,000 farms in Massachusetts. What's that kind of conversation like? Well, that's a very interesting dynamic. And I think, you know, the data point for the industry is you better go talk to the farmer. It's really been interesting. The hesitation from a farmer to talk to a semiconductor company was odd, but I wasn't John Deere when I was at Monsanto. So they were a little more open and they understand a lot of these farmers that I'm dealing with now are generational. You know, they're fifth, sixth generation. They really haven't made significant change on their farm in 100 years. Probably nor do they have a lot of data that's automated, right? There's probably a lot of things that are in Excel. And a lot of it is, I mean, beyond their first level of contact, say with a seed or a pesticide manufacturer, they have no idea what's going on in the rest of the world. Unlike, you know, a lot of big, large farms that we see. But at the smaller region, they are, they're regional. And we still have Hatfield, McCoy type things going on in New England where families don't talk to each other. They don't share information. So through one of our work groups, we actually invited two of them. And I felt like matchmaker. We were trying to just get these two to talk. And they did, and they both realized that they were spending way too much money on fertilizer. And they were both over-watering. So they're still a Hatfield and McCoy's, but at least they, I think they wink at each other every once in a while. Right, that was it. I'm glad that you brought that up. That was something that was talked about a number of times today is the lack of collaboration. Maybe that's still in the sort of competitive stage. So Rosa, talk to us about ripe IO. First of all, I think the name is fantastic. But blockchain and food, what's the synergy? And what opportunity did you see coming from the financial services industry? So one of the key points about what we felt brings all this together is creating a web of trust. And so in financial markets, insurance markets, healthcare markets, big institutional regulated markets, there's a lot of regulations that really bind together that notion of trust because you have a way in which you could effectively call out foul. Now, and so there's a center of gravity in each of those industries, whether it's a central bank or a state regulator insurance or the government in healthcare, here there's none. It's disparate, it's completely fragmented. Yet somehow, magically, we all get food every day and we're not dead. And so from that perspective, we just marvel at the fact that you're there. So bringing blockchain was a way to basically talk to the farmer, talk to the distributor, talk to the buyer, the producer, and all these different constituents, including certifiers, USDA, whomever it might be, and then also even health companies, right? So that you can relate it. So the idea is to basically take all of these disparate sets of data because they don't necessarily collaborate in full, capture it in the way that we're working with ADI so that you can create a real story about where that food came from, how it was accurated, how did it get transported, what's in it, do I get it on time, is it ripe, is it tasty, and so on, right? And so we looked at blockchain as a technology and enabling technology that quickly captures the data, allows each to preserve its own security about it and then combine it so that you can achieve real outcomes so you can automate things like were you sustainable? Were you of quality? Did you meet these taste factors? Was it certified? That's what excited us. We thought, this is a perfect place because you got to feed nine billion people and no one trusts their food, you know? So we felt this would be an excellent opportunity to deploy blockchain. And it's interesting that the transparency is one of the things that we hear from the consumers, we want all these things. We want hormone free, cage free, et cetera. We want organic, we want to make sure it is organic, but we also want that transparency. I'm curious since that you are talking to the farmers, the distributors, and the consumers, what were some of the different requirements coming from each? And how do you blend that to really have that visibility or that traceability from seed to consumption? And it's a good point, right? Because there's all these competing factors where farmers want certain information done. They don't want the price to go to zero because it's so commoditized. The distributor, I'm not entirely sure if they want anybody to know what they do is they deliver it, they've done their job. The aggregator, a grocery store, a restaurant or whomever are really feeling the pinch of demographic changes, not only in America, but globally. About this notion that I need to know more about my food. Millennials are doing it, look at Amazon and Whole Foods, right? That is a tipping point of where this is all going to go. So for us, to be able, what blockchain does allows for each of those drivers to remain clean. And so in essence, what you can do is you take something called smart contracts. Not a great word, but basically these are codes in which you've got a checklist or if then statements that you can say what does the farmer want? What is the distributor doing to get something there and of course the buyer? And so in that sense, we've talked a lot about a scorecard or this notion that you can basically highlight and show all of these different values so that if the consumer is looking for, I definitely want this in my lettuce and my beets and whatever it is and I need to make this type of salad, how acidic should my tomatoes be? Let's combine all that information. Since we're capturing that data set and validating it to make sure that they're true, then you actually enable that trust for that consumer. So the consumer may want a lot of information. The issues is will they pay for it? There's some evidence that they will. The second part is does the grocer have the ability to manage wide varietals in their shell space and so on. All the techniques that a grocer would go through, yet they want a clean supply chain. So what we're saying is that this is definitely not easy and so we're taking it where the influencer of the entire chain is able to help drive it and meanwhile we're trying to help create a farmer community that creates a level of trust. Buying those together, we believe blockchain and a lot of the technology that ADI is that deploying helps achieve that. And it sounds like from a technology perspective, you're leveraging blockchain, big data, aggregating that to help farmers. Even consumers, grocers, retailers become more data-driven businesses. Oh, absolutely. I mean, in one instance we've got a customer that's learning how blockchain can be used to open up their markets and improve their existing customer service. So what they have are data sets. Rob would definitely understand this, but basically they have data sets on what's best for apples, pears, avocados to ripen. Now, they know it in their heads, right? But the issue is they don't know when there's conditions that change. The grocery store says I want Braeburn apples to be 20% more crisper. Well, they actually have the answer, but they don't know how to tie all that together. So this data-driven capability exposes automation so that you can fulfill on that, create new markets, because if your grocers don't have it, you can go find it from elsewhere. And for the consumer, you're going to deliver that component on time. And so in that sense, these things are revealed as ways to not only lower cost in the end, blockchain has this sort of notion that it lowers cost. Like any technology, if you insert it, it typically adds cost. And I'm not saying that our blockchain does, but the greater value is branding, preserving it. And better economic consequence about it. A better customer satisfaction because I now have knowledge and transparency. So you can't value these things, right? Because I'm a millennial, like all of a sudden I got all my information, well, how did you value it? I just paid $60 at Whole Foods, or is it something else? So we think that there's a whole new economic revitalization about the entire farming system and the food nag system because if you show the transparency, you got something. That's so interesting. Last question, almost out of time. Rob, you mentioned a lot of small farms in Massachusetts. Where are those small farms in terms of readiness to look at technologies and the influence of big data? Is it still fairly early in those discussions? Or is your market more the larger farms that? I said it earlier, we're at the beginning of the beginning. I was actually shocked, excuse me. When I went out and started talking to them, I was under some assumption that a lot of this was already going on. And it turns out it's not, certainly at that level. So we were like new to these guys and the fact that we had a technology that would help them was unique to them. The issue was, well, how do you communicate with them? How would you sell that? What's the distribution channel? So through a lot of the workshops that we do with the farmers, we ask the question, if there's new technology and you want to go get it, what do you do? They Google it. I said, okay, that's probably not the answer I was looking for. But no, the supporting infrastructure, the rest of the ecosystem they need to take advantage just isn't there yet. So a lot of that I think is slow for the adoption. But it's also kind of helped us because we're working on technologies and timing is everything. So the fact that we've had time to catch up to what we thought was really needed and then learned more from the farm but won't know, this is really what they want. So we've been able to iterate. We're a very small team. We've been able to fail miserably many, many times. But the good news is when we're successful that's all people see. And the farmers are starting to see that that, hey, we're getting actionable data. You're telling me things that I kind of knew because they fly by in the seat of their pants a lot. They want it validated, verified. Oh yeah, they're very trustworthy as you said. There's a big pushback to spend any money on anything I had a farm. That's just the way it is. It's not anything unique. So when you show up now with some technology that could help them, they just want to make sure that your spot on, you can predict what it is. And when they hand me the money, they can start planning on their return on their investment. Well gentlemen, we want to thank you so much for sharing your insights, blockchain of food, what ADI is doing in their 50th year. Sounds like the beginning of the big beginning it's very exciting and we wish you the best of luck. Not going to hold my breath that you're going to like tomatoes but you know, we wish you the best of luck and enjoy the rest of today. We want to thank you for watching theCUBE at the Food IT event from Fork to Farm. I'm Lisa Martin, thanks for watching.