SafetySpect CEO to Speak at DC Innovation Summit on Food Safety

GRAND FORKS, ND, UNITED STATES, September 30, 2026 /CourierPR/ -- Kenneth Barton, the President and CEO of SafetySpect, Inc., will speak at the 12th Annual Wharton DC Innovation Summit on Thursday, October 1, 2026. The summit, which will take place at the Valo Park Conference Center in Tysons Corner, Virginia, will feature a panel discussion on the topic of "Food as Medicine, Food Safety" within the Summit's Healthcare Track. The session will run from 11:45 a.m. to 12:45 p.m. ET.

Kenneth Barton will join an esteemed panel of leaders in nutrition, public health, microbiology, and food safety to examine how food can help prevent and manage disease, and how it becomes a serious health risk when food safety systems fail. The panel will also discuss how SafetySpect's contamination detection technology, including its CSI handheld inspection system, can move food safety from a reactive testing model to a proactive prevention model.

SafetySpect, Inc., a developer of optical sensing platforms and AI-driven contamination detection technology, has been validated with federal partners including the USDA, NIH, EPA, NOAA, the U.S. Army's DEVCOM, and ARPA-H. The company has delivered 100 CSI units through an Other Transaction Agreement (OTA) contract valued at $7.9 million, with the U.S. government currently its largest customer. Beyond food safety, SafetySpect applies the same optical sensing and AI platform to healthcare, with its commercially available HyperView device providing portable tissue oxygenation imaging. The company's pipeline includes WoundAssure (wound risk monitoring) and PIPA (pressure injury prevention), both advancing through ARPA-H-funded research, and QAT, a food authenticity technology developed with USDA support. SafetySpect is also a partner in the University of North Dakota's ARPA-H award of up to $19.9 million to deploy Edge4Care.ai, a decentralized AI platform for senior diabetes care. The company's portfolio is protected by more than 50 active patents and trademarks.

SafetySpect, Inc., founded in 2016 and headquartered in Grand Forks, North Dakota, with a technology and business office in Sherman Oaks, California, is a deep-technology company developing multimodal optical sensing platforms integrated with artificial intelligence to generate actionable health and safety insights. Its proprietary technologies combine optical imaging, spectroscopy, and edge AI to enable real-time, non-invasive assessment across food safety, healthcare, and defense applications.

The summit provides a platform for innovators to share their latest ideas and technologies, fostering collaboration and driving progress in various industries.

Kenneth Barton, the president and CEO of SafetySpect, Inc., will be available for meetings with interested parties before, during, or after the summit. Attendees can also connect with him following the Healthcare Track session and during the summit's networking lunch and evening reception.