IRI®, a fast-growing, innovative, global provider of technology, data, and predictive analytics for the consumer, retail, and media sectors, announced the appointment of Kirk Perry, Google’s president of global client & agency solutions, as president and CEO and a member of its board of directors, effective May 17, 2021. Perry succeeds Andrew Appel, who has successfully led a transformation of IRI for nearly a decade. Appel will remain an advisor to the company and member of the board of directors.

Although there may be a pandemic-related slowdown, there’s no stopping new product development targeted at the commercial and non-commercial foodservice sectors. To help readers with new product development strategy, Prepared Foods asked Jeff Miller, founder and CEO of Cutting Edge Innovation, to create a thought leadership series connecting R&D strategy to foodservice sales. Cutting Edge Innovation advises on foodservice strategy, sales, business development, and innovation. Miller also created an online course, “Turbocharge Your Foodservice Sales.” 

Want to talk candy trends? It’s not unusual to talk about new offerings combining both sweet and sour flavors. Then again, sweet and sour also describes life itself the candy industry.

The California Walnut Commission announced its second annual "Power of 3" global marketing campaign, which builds on the successful 2020 campaign. "Power of 3" launched on March 3 with a first-ever global event celebrated in the USA, Germany, India, Japan, South Korea, Spain, Turkey, the United Kingdom and the Middle East to showcase how they like to get their daily handful of walnuts.

Manus Bio Inc. (Manus Bio), announced the expansion of its sales and marketing team with the hires of Heather Barbarino as vice president of marketing and Gary Dempsey as vice president of sales & business development.

Marquee Brands LLC and Mediacast Holdings announced the initial launch of Martha Stewart Kitchen (MSK), a new retail brand of frozen and prepared food products from Martha Stewart, which are being brought to the market by the newly formed MSK Foods LLC.

Global innovation platform, Plug and Play, announced its newest location in Chicago. This office will focus on connecting startups, corporations, and investors working on innovating the food and beverage industry. Since 2017, Plug and Play has run a food and beverage program out of their headquarters in Silicon Valley and has since expanded to Bangkok, Milan, São Paulo, and Shanghai.

Ajinomoto Co., Inc., a producer of MSG committed to championing science and setting the record straight on the ingredient, announced a new campaign to address the heart of MSG's perception problem in the US: xenophobia-born misinformation.

The annual The Food Retailing Industry Speaks (Speaks) report, released by FMI—The Food Industry Association, finds that in 2019 the food retail industry saw strong operational performance, which helped the industry face challenges in 2020. At the same time, outside forces including trade, credit/debit card interchange fees and health care costs impacted food retailers and kept profit margins steady.

Widely recognized as the world’s premier  independently-owned flavor house, Edlong debuted Everything Dairy Can Be™ - an inspirational mantra that is driven by Edlong’s industry-leading dairy, dairy-based, and dairy-free ingredient capabilities.