Polysense raises $10.7M to scale AI quality control for food manufacturers

Belgian startup Polysense has raised $10.7
million in an oversubscribed seed funding round to accelerate the global
rollout of its AI-powered quality control platform for food manufacturers. The
round was led by Felix Capital, with participation from Fortino Ventures,
Syndicate One, 100IN and other angel investors.

Polysense develops AI-powered quality control
and process optimisation software for food manufacturers. Its platform helps
reduce waste by combining continuous in-line inspection with automated process
control. By combining continuous in-line inspection, real-time imaging data and
synthetic data models with automated process control, the platform detects
quality deviations as they occur and automatically adjusts production
parameters before waste is generated.

The platform consists of three integrated
products. Polysense Qualify continuously inspects every product on the
production line in real time, while the Polysense Platform consolidates quality
and process data into a single view to identify variability and improvement
opportunities. Polysense AutoControl automatically adjusts machine settings to
compensate for changing ingredients and production conditions.

The funding comes just over a year after
Polysense raised $2.2 million and focused exclusively on food manufacturing.
Since then, the company has progressed from early pilots to commercial
deployments with major food producers including Agristo, Darta and Poppies
Bakeries.

Initially launched in Europe, the platform has since expanded into
the United States and the Middle East, with customers increasing the scale of
their deployments across vegetable, potato, bakery, confectionery and packaging
production lines.

Yarne De Munck, CEO and co-founder of
Polysense, said:

The past twelve months have been
incredible. The traction is real. We went from early pilots to live deployments
with some of the largest food manufacturers in the world, and they are growing
their rollouts. The food industry has been waiting for a solution to this
problem. Polysense delivers one that works. This funding lets us move faster
and reach many more lines around the world. We are just getting started.

Food waste remains a major challenge for
manufacturers, creating a significant opportunity for technologies that can
improve production efficiency. According to Eurostat, food and beverage
manufacturing accounts for 19 per cent of all food waste in the EU. Variations
in raw materials, including moisture, density and product characteristics,
combined with fixed production settings, make it difficult for manufacturers to
identify and correct quality issues before products are lost.

Polysense’s platform is designed to automate
this process, enabling continuous monitoring and real-time corrective action.

The new funding will be used to expand
Polysense’s product across more stages of the food production process, enabling
manufacturers to automate a wider range of quality control and process
optimisation tasks. The company also plans to grow its engineering, sales and
customer success teams, while investing in faster deployments to support its
expanding international customer base.