Behind the scenes: IXON Kickstarter fulfillment

Ever wondered what kind of effort it takes to make a medium-rare steak shelf-stable? Apparently over 48 hours of work.

“Twice a week, my team and I would spend a whole day in the pilot factory prepping the meat, and the next day performing sterilization, filling and packaging.” says Felix Cheung, founder and CEO of IXON. “Afterwards we would need another whole day to do secondary packaging and fulfillment.”

“I don’t think people realize how difficult it is to package food aseptically, especially when it is done manually,” says Cheung. “It’s like building an iPhone with all parts like the display, the camera, the chip, as well as the box, all hand-crafted.”

Cheung explained that this is why automation is key to commercializing advanced sous-vide aseptic packaging (ASAP), a technology he and co-founder Elton Ho developed for keeping meat fresh at room temperature. The processing time would then be drastically reduced from days to minutes.

“We wanted to deliver a premium tangible product to our backers, and I think ultimately we delivered,” says Cheung who designed the packaging of the final product. “I just hope that people will like our product after trying it.”

有沒有想過要令五成熟牛扒可以在室溫下保存需要付出什麼程度的勞力？答案是超過48小時的工作時間。

IXON創始人兼首席執行官張文浩先生說：「我和我的團隊需要花一整天時間處理牛肉豬肉，然後第二天進行滅菌、填充和包裝，此活動每週進行兩次。之後我們還需要一整天時間來進行二次包裝和處理送貨事宜。」

張說：「外人是很難想像無菌包裝食物有多困難，尤其在手動情況下完成。這好比製作iPhone，但所有部件包括顯示屏、相機、芯片、甚至包裝盒都是手工製作的。」

張解釋要使先進低溫真空無菌包裝（ASAP）成功商業化，全自動化是關鍵所在，該技術由他和何耀權先生共同開發，用於令肉類在室溫下保持新鮮。若然成功，製作時間將由幾天縮短至幾分鐘。

負責產品包裝最終設計的張說：「我們希望為支持者提供優質有形產品，我認為最終結果是滿意的。我只希望人們在試用我們產品後會喜歡它。」