ArcticRx by ChefsFridge Co.

Stuart Lowry spent decades in nonprofit organizations, including a successful tenure as Director of the Indianapolis Parks Department. It was in that position that he learned about food equity and that there were communities not only in Indianapolis but around the State of Indiana — indeed throughout the world — that were “food deserts,” described as areas where access to nutritious, affordable food is limited. Shane Bivens enjoyed a rich and diverse career in technology and as a consultant in organizational development, psychology and rapid growth strategies. His entrepreneurial background eventually led him to the pharmaceutical industry where he worked as a consultant for product development of innovative medical products. It was there that Shane discovered his passion for finding solutions for food equity and food deserts around the world.

Stuart and Shane met through the Indiana regional grants program and recognized their shared concern about food insecurity and an intense desire to help address them. The 2, both native Hoosiers, co-founded ChefsFridge Co. and left the program agreeing to partner in a start-up addressing food insecurity challenges. Their goal was to create a peer-to-peer kiosk system bringing fresh food to neighborhoods where access was limited by geography or income. “The original concept was ‘food sharing,’” Stuart explained. “It was a 24-hour kiosk serviced by local culinary experts. It was all fresh food, good for your body and priced so local residents would have affordable access to healthy meals. That’s why we named the company ‘ChefsFridge.’ We were creating the closest thing to a chef stepping out of a fridge to deliver you a fresh meal.”

The company was quickly funded and ready to develop its first prototype. As Stuart and Shane were moving confidently to enter the space of foodtech and develop an innovative product to address food insecurity, the unthinkable happened: the worldwide COVID-19 pandemic. As the pandemic persisted from weeks to months, the two co-founders realized a major pivot would be needed to keep their entrepreneurial ambitions moving. “‘It’s never an easy conversation, but we decided not to start our ChefsFridge business and returned the funding back to our first investor,’” Stuart said.

It was October 2020, “the darkest time of COVID,” Stuart recalled and, though ChefsFridge might be stalled, Shane and Stuart had the resilience of successful entrepreneurs. They reevaluated their position and original concept. “We’re a start-up. We don’t have a product we’re launching. But we do have the background and all the connections,” Stuart said. They also had a Board member, Dr. Lisa Hoverman, helping with outreach for grants and federal funding. “We realized our technology could help transport and store on site the COVID vaccines, which required ultra-low temperatures and long-term refrigeration. Our refrigeration kiosk could be re-focused to store not just food, but vaccines as well,” he said. Beyond the pandemic, Stuart and Shane saw a tremendous opportunity for transporting other products with the ArcticRx technology. They knew a sustainable business could be created around the product and fundamentally reshape the availability of essential medicines, support critical research and create new circular economies, improving global health and food access. Dr. Hoverman also happened to be working with another Indianapolis-based aerospace and defense company that was seeking new technologies and products to help with vaccine transportation and distribution. That company was immediately interested in the ChefsFridge’s refrigerated kiosk concept. “The company offered talented thermal engineers and the opportunity to adapt defense-related and propulsion thermal control technologies to make a leap in passive transport and storage, which had not been achieved in over 50 years,” Stuart explained.

“We gave the firm a long list of engineering requirements, which we learned from many well-documented articles related to the pharmaceutical industry’s challenges in developing and transporting the MRNA treatments. The specifications for the new product needed to be kept at minus 78°C for weeks without electricity or any power source and while the container is repeatedly opened and closed. And it also had to fit through any doorway in the world to accommodate any distribution site.” Eventually, Stuart and Shane contracted a team of thermal engineers to develop the advanced thermodynamics and heat transfer processes within the physical refrigeration product–and they quickly saw success.

The list of engineering requirements was so exact and so extensive, Stuart and Shane doubted they would hear from the engineers again. But they did. “With their help, we had a product that was thermally optimized to a point that no one else had managed,” Stuart said. “It would get the package to temperature rapidly with no preconditioning and keep it at that temperature for weeks, well beyond the pharmaceutical time required between first and second doses required by many biologic therapies. The doses could remain at a stable temperature beyond that time, even when repeatedly opening and closing the box. “It’s reusable (possibly for years), it’s robust, it’s designed for smart manufacturability, and we found the technology and partners to make them wholly (100%) in the United States,” Stuart said.

Developing hardtech products, those that require physical hardware, integrated software and advanced manufacturing, can often take years – or even decades – to take to market. With the pandemic racing around the globe, the two co-founders realized product development had to be expedited. With his organizational psychology background, Shane went back to what he described as “an antiquated method, called ADDIE. Analyze, Design, Develop, Implement, Evaluate and it’s primarily used for developing learning tools or curriculum. But I believed we could use this method to accelerate our process.” The product design, thermal engineering and founding teams met consistently 2 or 3 times a week and discussed progress. Different aspects of the physical design were placed in theoretical ‘buckets.’ “If we were in the ‘analyze’ phase, we couldn’t start building anything until we reached the place where we all agreed we were ready to make a drawing,” he explained. “We were ready to implement when we overcame several of the thermal engineering challenges. We built the first prototype with wood, then we moved to 3D printed versions, and eventually made our way to the final plastic shell design. Sometimes someone would see something, and we’d realize we needed to design it slightly differently. That’s the power of ADDIE. It’s a creative process you can repeat at each stage, and it keeps you focused on milestones and learning from previous outcomes.”

“It really kept us on track,” Shane continued. “Otherwise, I think this would have taken 10 or 15 years to optimize the thermodynamics, decide what materials we were going to use, and integrate the software and IoT (Internet of Things) sensors. We could have kept spinning and spinning but going through these steps and allowing everyone’s ideas and suggestions to be in a bucket but not necessarily acted upon immediately really kept us moving.”

By the time the process had moved to the 4^th iteration, the team knew what questions needed answers and what design challenges remained, and all those issues could be plugged into our product development framework. The ArcticRx units would eventually include advanced sensors, IoT connectivity, and innovative cooling systems to ensure the products inside the unit would stay at the right temperature for the specific storage duration period.

“Establishing a production process with all of the necessary capital equipment and machines is very expensive,” Stuart pointed out. “So, we turned to Conexus Indiana and the Indiana Economic Development Corporation to find some support through the Manufacturing Readiness Grants program.” ArcticRx applied to the program in 2023 and secured an MRG matching grant of $114,000 for production tooling, thermoforming and rotational blow molding equipment for its “first production” run of 10 units. ArcticRx partnered with an advanced, Indiana-based plastics manufacturer based in Plainfield to keep production and assembly within the State and close proximity to the ArcticRx lab. “Because we secured some grant funding from the State, we managed to build this whole thing with no debt and do it locally, Shane said. “We went from concept to prototype and from final design into manufacturing production with as few resources as possible. It was very scrappy like you would expect from a small startup.”

The ArcticRx unit is a complex hardtech product, the two explained. Beyond the engineering of the physical unit, the materials and the sensors, it’s very sophisticated. “Our goal wasn’t to find everything necessary for our growth in Indiana. We were saying we want to find the best things and the best expertise no matter the location, but it turned out they were in Indiana,” Stuart said. “All the things Shane said about the ADDIE process were easier when it turned out the expertise and resources were right here. Without those team members, I don’t think we’d be half the company we are today.”

Another benefit of working locally with so many innovative minds is the wealth of knowledge, expertise and collaboration available to a hardtech startup. “We stayed in Indiana because we just kept discovering more support,” Shane explained. They recently received an INTAP grant (the Indiana Technical Assistance Program through the Indiana Small Business Development Center) with an IoT company located just 2 doors from ArcticRx’s location in the Indiana IoT Lab’s co-working space. Shane talked about one serendipitous event emanating from that location. “We’re integrating a lot of advanced sensors to ensure the unit maintains a very specific ultra-low temperature,” he said. “Maybe one of the biggest innovations is that our units have no energy. It’s just a pod. It doesn’t plug in like a refrigerator. There are no “plug in” requirements or battery/solar energy source. And because of the performance period eclipsing any existing technology, we needed specialized sensors to monitor the temperature over long periods (weeks) and testing for this performance period has been intense.” But Shane recalled an employee of a different company in the IoT Lab who monitored refrigeration and cooling systems for restaurants all over Central Indiana. That gentleman heard of the search for the right sensors. “He said he had one at his desk,” Shane recalled. “And he brought it over to our lab space and we had a product demo in the building and never looked back.”

“Working in a collaborative space like the Indiana IoT Lab, with this type of atmosphere, there are all kinds of entrepreneurs and innovators doing cool things and we can work together and share resources,” Shane said. “When we bring in a manufacturing partner, or a design partner or expertise from industry, we didn’t have any intention of saying, ‘Let’s build an all-Indiana team that only builds things in Indiana and only promotes what Indiana does.’ But it’s a happy accident.”

From the Indiana IoT Lab co-working space to world-class engineering talent for product design, development and testing as well as a local manufacturing partner, Indiana is a State that has resources to support entrepreneurs who are developing physical products. The ArcticRx team credited the Manufacturing Readiness Grants program as a key resource in kick-starting their transition from product development to a first production run in partnership with an Indiana manufacturer. They also leveraged engineering and technical expertise within a major global corporation headquartered in Indianapolis. The collaboration between the corporation and ArcticRx was not just about leveraging technical knowledge, but also about sharing personnel to assist in the development and testing of the ArcticRx prototypes. Stuart said brazen passion is the primary need when reaching out and requesting partnership from such organizations. “Pick up the phone,” Stuart encouraged. “Be mission-driven.” Shane echoed that advice. “Help people do what they already want to do.” He explained that success in large corporations is measured in project success and efficient operations, while startups measure success in investor pitches, funding and reaching milestones. Shane continued, “It’s important to leverage those differing measurements when seeking a partnership with large corporations.”

“We are a zero-debt company, and a big part of that is because we’re in Indiana. It’s cheaper to operate here, and there’s access to top talent, engineering, physical space and innovation resources,” Stuart said.