Industry Biotechnology Headquarters Oslo Number of employees 10 | Website www.keep-it.no/en Founded 4 December 2001 Type of business Private limited company | |
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Key people Kristen Aksel Hovland (CEO) | ||
Keep-it Technologies (formerly TimeTemp) is a spin-off technology company from The Norwegian University of Life Sciences (NMBU) in Ås, just outside Oslo in Norway. Keep-it Technologies has offices and manufacturing facilities at Furuset in Oslo. The company is primarily engaged in research and technology development of a shelf-life indicator for temperature-sensitive products, such as food, pharmaceuticals and chemicals. The company’s research efforts have received financial support from the Research Council of Norway’s Food Programme, as well as from Innovation Norway’s industrial R&D scheme (IFU).
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The business
Keep-it Technologies has developed a time and temperature indicator (TTI) that shows the remaining shelf life of products better than the traditional static date stamp. The technology behind the indicator has been developed and verified at the University, before a working prototype was finally developed. Keep-it Technologies has patented the indicator in a number of countries, including the USA.
Keep-it Technologies’ shelf-life indicator comprises two small chambers with different ingredients that react and change colour depending on time and temperature. A blue bar moves gradually from left to right and eventually disappears. The blue bar moves slow at low temperatures and faster as the temperature increases. The indicator is attached as a self-adhesive label to the packaging by the food producer. It monitors the time and temperature the packages is exposed to from production, during transport, at the retailer, and in the consumer’s own fridge. In this way the device gives more correct indication of remaining shelf life (days left) than traditional date-stamping, because it takes into account the actual temperature to which the individual food package has been exposed.