The food and drink industry, especially the sectors that serve the grocery retail market, sits in the perfect storm of increasing government- and industry-mandated regulation around product traceability and temperature management; expanding demand from customers (and therefore from retailers) for reasonably priced, high-quality alternatives to eating out; public concerns regarding food safety and labeling; and the increasing pressure from food retailers for innovative new recipes - average product life cycle is approximately six months - at ever lower prices, all while food and commodity prices are reaching global high prices.

All of these challenges impact upon storage and distribution of fresh and short-life food and beverage products, from suppliers to manufacturers and on to wholesalers and retailers.

Recent developments and advances in technology are starting to provide tools to face up to the challenges outlined above. Cloud-based solutions are taking this development forward, with even SMEs able to comply with manufacturing and retailer client's requirements regarding the ever tighter planning of orders and deliveries, pallet and load building, labeling and advanced shipping notifications.

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Keywords: Logistics Management, Supply Chain Management, SCM IT, Supply Chain Planning, Food Logistics, Food Supply Chain Technology, Cloud, SaaS