Fresh2 Acquires Youfood to Enhance Food Supply Chain Management Capabilities

Fresh2 Group, a B2B eCommerce and supply chain management company serving the restaurant and food industry, has acquired Youfood Group, a business-to-customer cross-border eCommerce platform.

The company has done so through its subsidiary, Fresh2 Technology, which signed a definitive stock purchase agreement (SPA) for the acquisition, Fresh2Group said in a Thursday (Jan. 4) press release.

The acquisition will connect Asian and South American food resources with North American customers and is expected to enhance the company’s access to a new customer base, according to the release.

“We are committed to sustainable development in the food service industry and to continuously bring diverse high-quality food products to North American consumers,” Fresh2 CEO Haohan Xu said in the release. “This acquisition provides us with an excellent opportunity to integrate and enhance our capabilities, thereby improving performance and expanding our food supply chain ecosystem.”

The capabilities of Youfood Group will join Fresh2 Group’s existing digital technologies and business models that aim to drive the online transformation of the restaurant supply industry, refine restaurant operations and build a global network of restauranteurs, according to the press release.

The company’s supply chain management system is designed to help restaurants lower their procurement costs and improve their efficiency, the release said.

PYMNTS Intelligence has found that automation platforms may aid restaurants of all sizes in streamlining back-end processes.

Automating B2B tools such as payments, pricing and vendor management could aid restaurants in cost-cutting and in freeing up time, effort and personnel resources, according to the “Restaurant Readiness Index,” a PYMNTS Intelligence and Paytronix collaboration.

The food and beverage sector faces several shortcomings when it comes to B2B payments, along with an analog ordering process and a checkout experience that is not always consumer grade, Jordan Huck, CEO of restaurant supply chain marketplace notch, said in March 2022.

At that time, notch had just launched a payment platform called notchPay that is powered by B2B payments company Balance.

“As the food and beverage industry continues to rebound from the pandemic, there is a growing demand for solutions that simplify the wholesale ordering process,” Huck said at the time.

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