Verified
Tyson Foods
Experimenting- Meat and poultry
- ~133,000 employees (2025)
- AI refrigeration controls at 5 sites
- No AI return reported
- No named AI owner
Tyson Foods deploys AI in specific operations rather than through a named company-wide platform: computer vision on plant lines, AI refrigeration controls at five facilities, AI consumer insights in product development, and Tyson Translate, an AI speech translation tool open to every team member. Tyson Foods has reported no business return it credits to AI, no count of AI users and no AI models or AI spending. Jeff Schomburger, CEO since Oct 4, 2026, cited AI acceleration as an opportunity in May 2026.
tysonfoods.comTheir approach to AI
- The platform
- Tyson Foods has no named enterprise AI platform; its analytics run on Data@Tyson, built on Google Cloud BigQuery, with Palantir Foundry and SAP in its enterprise data architecture (Oct 2026 job postings).
- The models
- Tyson Foods has not named a model vendor; it built its own machine learning and computer vision models for plant lines (Nov 2023) and is securing SAP's Joule AI assistant inside its SAP systems (Oct 2026 job posting).
- The reach
- Tyson Translate, an AI speech translation tool in 51 languages, is open to every Tyson Foods team member from day one (FY2025), and Oct 2026 job postings expect all professional staff to use approved AI tools.
- The catch
- Tyson Foods reports no business return credited to AI, no count of AI users, no AI spending and no executive who owns AI; its one AI figure is a 12-15% electricity cut at a 2024 refrigeration pilot, with no cost attached.
Snapshot
- Employees
- ~133,000
- Sep 27, 2025: about 116,000 in the U.S., 110,000 of them at plants, warehouses, hatcheries and other non-corporate sites (FY2025 Form 10-K)
- Technology budget
- Not disclosed
- FY2025 research and development costs were $126M, covering product work and process automation in plants
- AI/ML headcount
- Not disclosed
- Global Technology hires in Springdale, Torreón (Mexico), Bengaluru (India) and Lisbon (Portugal)
- Who owns AI
- No named AI owner
- Global Technology runs under a CTO; Mike Wheeler took the role in 2025 but was off the leadership page by Nov 2026
- Platform
- No named AI platform
- Data@Tyson on Google Cloud BigQuery; Palantir Foundry and SAP in the data architecture (Oct 2026 postings)
- Models
- Not disclosed
- Own machine learning and computer vision models on plant lines (Nov 2023); SAP Joule being secured (Oct 2026)
- Reach
- Tyson Translate for all staff
- 51 languages (FY2025); professional staff expected to use approved AI tools (Oct 2026)
- Use cases
- No count published
- Plant vision, refrigeration controls, consumer insights, translation, supply chain planning, coding agents
Key findings
Tyson Foods has reported no business return it credits to AI; its only published AI figure, in the FY2025 Sustainability Report of Aug 2026, is a 12-15% cut in site electricity, including 22-28% in refrigeration electricity, at one facility during a 2024 AI refrigeration control pilot, with no cost figure; Tyson Foods added the system at four more U.S. locations in 2025.
Tyson Foods' FY2025 Sustainability Report lists Tyson Translate, an AI speech translation tool for real-time conversations in 51 languages, as available to every team member from day one, without saying how many use it; frontline staff make up more than 80% of Tyson Foods' roughly 133,000-person workforce.
Tyson Foods has not named an AI owner, and its technology chief has changed often: Doug Kulka was quoted as Chief Information & Technology Officer in Jul 2025, Mike Wheeler, a Tyson Foods finance executive, became Chief Technology Officer in 2025, and by Nov 2026 none of the five executives on the Enterprise Leadership Team held a technology title.
Tyson Foods' board formed a Technology Committee that first met on Mar 31, 2025, chaired by former Cisco COO Maria Martinez, and from fiscal 2025 the senior executive bonus plan has carried a data and digital goal that can move payouts by up to 2.5% of target.
Jeff Schomburger, a Procter & Gamble veteran on the Tyson Foods board since 2016, became CEO on Oct 4, 2026, after naming AI acceleration among his opportunities on May 28, 2026; Donnie King told analysts in May 2026 that Tyson Foods uses AI-driven consumer insights in product innovation and in Aug 2026 that it had tested products using agentic AI.
Where Tyson sits
- Stage
- Experimenting
Tyson Foods has reported no business return it credits to AI, which places it in Experimenting: its only published AI figure, a 12-15% cut in site electricity at one facility during a 2024 AI refrigeration control pilot (FY2025 Sustainability Report, Aug 2026), is a pilot energy measure with no cost figure, and Donnie King's May 2026 remark that AI-driven consumer insights were improving innovation, distribution and pricing decisions carried no number. Tyson Foods has not reported a company-wide AI rollout with a user count: Tyson Translate, an AI speech translation tool, is open to every team member with no usage figure, and Oct 2026 job postings expect professional staff to use approved AI tools without saying how many do. Tyson Foods falls short of Piloting because it has published no realized return credited to AI in any use case, such as a cost saving from the refrigeration controls now at five facilities, and has named neither an executive who owns AI nor how many of its roughly 133,000 employees use AI tools.
How the stages are defined - Ownership
- No named AI owner; Global Technology under a CTO (Mike Wheeler from 2025); board Technology Committee
- Platform
- Hybrid: Own vision models plus bought tools; data on Google Cloud
- Models
- Not disclosed; SAP Joule being secured for SAP systems
- Hosting
- Not disclosed for AI models; Data@Tyson analytics on Google Cloud BigQuery, with Palantir Foundry and SAP (Oct 2026 job postings)
- Reach
- Tyson Translate for every team member; approved AI tools for professional staff
How they deploy
Business problem first
Tyson Foods' technology leaders said in Nov 2023 that the company starts from a business problem and scales a solution only after it shows incremental value, so investment stays spread out and justified. Adam Clark, then vice president of IT for Fresh Meats, Poultry and Prepared Foods, said it is "not tech for the sake of tech," and Balaji Viswanath, then managing director of IT emerging tech, called Tyson Foods' generative AI deployment value-driven and aimed at the right use cases.
Data and digital as a strategic enabler
Tyson Foods lists Data and Digital Delivery among the five enablers of its strategy in its FY2025 Sustainability Report, beside operational excellence and capital allocation. Tyson Foods' senior executive bonus plan for fiscal 2025 added an enterprise goal to deliver business unit data and digital planned projects, which can move each executive's payout by up to 2.5% of target either way (Dec 2025 proxy statement).
AI acceleration under a new CEO
Jeff Schomburger said on May 28, 2026, when Tyson Foods named him to succeed Donnie King, that he was energized by the chance to capitalize on emerging opportunities through AI acceleration. Schomburger told analysts on Aug 3, 2026 that he would stay the course on the existing strategy and say more about his priorities the following quarter, and he took over as President and CEO on Oct 4, 2026; Tyson Foods had not published an AI plan under his leadership by Nov 1, 2026.
AI in consumer insights and product development
Donnie King told analysts on May 4, 2026 that Tyson Foods uses AI-driven insights to identify emerging consumer preferences, and said the capability was speeding its innovation pipeline, improving decisions on distribution and pricing and making marketing more effective, citing the Jimmy Dean higher-protein breakfast line. King said on Aug 3, 2026 that Tyson Foods had tested a number of products using agentic AI and would expand that work, alongside digital tools that collect first-party consumer data.
Scouting AI through Tyson Ventures
Tyson Ventures, Tyson Foods' venture arm, devoted Tyson Demo Day 2025 to AI in food innovation and branding: 11 startups pitched in Jul 2025 and six moved to further talks with Tyson Foods businesses, including the enterprise agent platform Orby AI and the consumer-trend analytics firms Qloo and Tastewise. Tyson Ventures' 2024 Demo Day on supply chains advanced Pactum AI, which automates supplier negotiations, and SnoFox, which optimizes industrial refrigeration energy use, and its portfolio includes Oxipital AI, a maker of AI machine vision for food inspection.
Plant automation alongside AI
Tyson Foods' newest plants lean on automation that the company does not describe as AI. The Danville, Virginia plant, opened in Nov 2023 as one of Tyson Foods' most automated, has robotic palletizing and vision grading in product inspection, and the Bowling Green, Kentucky bacon plant, opened in Jan 2024, uses robots, driverless forklifts and autonomous guided vehicles. Tyson Foods' research and development covers manual process automation in processing and grow-out operations, and its Tyson Manufacturing and Automation Center, opened in 2019, includes a vision technology lab.
- Deployment model
- Tyson Foods runs technology through a central Global Technology organization with hubs in Springdale, Arkansas; Torreón, Mexico; Bengaluru, India; and Lisbon, Portugal, led by a Chief Technology Officer to whom the Chief Information Security Officer reports (FY2025 Form 10-K); Tyson Foods' leadership page listed Mike Wheeler as CTO, a role he took in 2025, over information systems, cybersecurity, data and digital, and digital transformation and innovation. Tyson Foods aligns IT leaders and data teams with business units, and plant AI is built by cross-functional teams from operations, IT and engineering, as with the in-line product identification system described in Nov 2023. An Oct 2026 posting for Tyson Foods' Torreón hub describes a senior engineering role that takes over the duties of four specialized senior roles and encodes engineering standards into AI coding agents so junior developers can work across the stack.
- Model providers
- Tyson Foods has not named a large language model provider. Tyson Foods said in Nov 2023 that it had developed and deployed its own machine learning models and computer vision for in-line product identification, and that its first generative AI deployments had delivered quick value, without naming the models behind them. Tyson Foods' Oct 2026 job postings ask professional staff to use approved AI tools, mention AI copilots and large language models in data engineering, and describe securing SAP's Joule AI assistant inside Tyson Foods' SAP systems. Tyson Foods has not named the vendor of its AI refrigeration control system, and Gatik supplies the autonomous driving system on the trucks it runs for Tyson Foods.
- Data and infrastructure
- Scott Spradley, Tyson Foods' CTO from 2017 to 2023, said in Nov 2020 that one of his first moves was to consolidate Tyson Foods onto a single enterprise platform before building predictive capabilities and computer vision. Tyson Foods' analytics platform, Data@Tyson, runs on Google Cloud: an operations posting names BigQuery, Cloud Composer, Pub/Sub, Firestore, Dataflow and Cloud Run, data engineers work in dbt and feed Power BI reporting, and Tyson Foods' enterprise data architecture names BigQuery, Palantir Foundry and the Workday and SAP ecosystem as the platform direction (Oct 2026 job postings). Tyson Foods has not said where any AI model runs; its FY2025 Form 10-K notes reliance on software-as-a-service and cloud hosting providers.
Platforms and internal tools
Data@TysonBy Oct 2026
Data@Tyson is Tyson Foods' enterprise data platform on Google Cloud, which takes in data from SAP, DB2, USDA and other sources through BigQuery and related Google Cloud services and supplies modeled data for analytics, Power BI reporting and AI and machine learning work.
Tyson Translate and Tyson Language ServicesBy FY2025
Tyson Translate is an AI-powered speech translation tool for real-time conversations in 51 languages on any device. Tyson Language Services, formed in FY2025, combines human translators with AI and machine learning to translate videos, voiceovers and enterprise-wide surveys, beside Interpreter On Demand, a remote video and phone interpreting service.
- Users
- Available to every team member globally from day one
AI refrigeration control system2024 pilot
Tyson Foods' AI refrigeration control system tracks the electricity use of plant refrigeration systems and acts to improve their performance; Tyson Foods piloted it at one facility in 2024 and added four more U.S. locations in 2025.
In-line computer vision for product identificationBy Nov 2023
Tyson Foods built machine learning models and computer vision that identify products automatically on the line, replacing a pre-labeling operation that was labor-intensive, error-prone and took up floor space.
- Models
- Proprietary machine learning and computer vision models
Supply chain planning applications on Palantir FoundryBy Oct 2026
Tyson Foods is hiring a Senior Development Engineer (Palantir Foundry) with supply chain planning knowledge, covering demand planning, inventory optimization, production scheduling and S&OP, preferably with hands-on Foundry development experience; related full-stack roles integrate predictive models and optimization solvers such as Gurobi into business applications.
Tyson Manufacturing and Automation Center2019
The Tyson Manufacturing and Automation Center in Springdale, Arkansas develops automation and robotics for Tyson Foods plants and trains team members on them, with a vision technology lab, training classrooms and a simulated production environment.
Vendors and partners
Google Cloud
Cloud for the Data@Tyson analytics platform · Tyson Foods' Oct 2026 job postings describe Data@Tyson on Google Cloud, with BigQuery, Cloud Composer, Pub/Sub, Firestore, Dataflow and Cloud Run named as the platform's services.
Palantir
Foundry in Tyson Foods' enterprise data architecture and supply chain planning work · Named in Oct 2026 job postings for planning engineers and data architects.
SAP
Enterprise systems; Joule AI assistant being secured · An Oct 2026 Tyson Foods security posting covers SAP S/4HANA, Ariba, Concur and Fieldglass and the secure integration of SAP Business AI and Joule.
GatikSep 2023
Autonomous refrigerated box trucks in Northwest Arkansas · Tyson Foods and Gatik announced a multi-year collaboration with a safety driver in the cab at first; Gatik still named Tyson Foods among its customers when it raised $200 million in Aug 2026, but neither company has said whether Tyson Foods routes now run without a driver.
Tyson Demo Day startupsJul 2025
AI startups in further talks with Tyson Foods businesses · Delineate, Orby AI, Prevera, Proxy Foods, Qloo and Tastewise were selected for continued conversations after Tyson Demo Day 2025.
Leadership
AI, data and platform leaders
Executives
Board
AI org map
Central Global Technology organization under a CTO; a board Technology Committee oversees technology strategy
Tyson Foods runs technology centrally: a Chief Technology Officer leads Global Technology and the Chief Information Security Officer reports to the CTO, according to the FY2025 Form 10-K. Tyson Foods' leadership page listed Mike Wheeler as CTO on the Enterprise Leadership Team, reporting to the CEO, after he took the role in 2025, but on Nov 1, 2026 none of the five executives on that team, CEO Jeff Schomburger, CFO Curt Calaway, COO Wes Morris, Chief Legal & Administrative Officer Adam Deckinger and Chief People Officer Jacqueline Hanson, held a technology title. The board's Technology Committee, created in fiscal 2025 and chaired by Maria Martinez, oversees technology strategy and innovation, cybersecurity and IT operations together with the CTO and CISO.
Tyson Foods does not disclose how many people work in technology, data or AI. Tyson Foods' Global Technology organization hires in Springdale, Arkansas; Torreón, Mexico; Bengaluru, India; and Lisbon, Portugal, and lists AI and machine learning, computer vision, data science, robotics and automation among its work. Tyson Foods outsourced part of its IT function to an unnamed global service provider in 2020, displacing about 330 IT employees, mostly in Springdale and Chicago, and has had three technology chiefs since Scott Spradley left in Jan 2023.
Reporting lines
Board of Directors
John H. Tyson, Chairman
Technology Committee
Maria Martinez, chair
First met Mar 31, 2025; oversees technology strategy and innovation, cybersecurity, compliance and IT operations; includes executives
President and CEO
Jeff Schomburger
Tyson Ventures
Curt Calaway, President; Heidi Solomon, Vice President
Venture arm; runs Tyson Demo Day, AI-themed in 2025
Chief Operating Officer
Wes Morris
Chicken, Beef, Pork, Prepared Foods and International segments, plus Logistics & Procurement
Global Technology
Chief Technology Officer; Mike Wheeler from 2025
Reporting line as listed on Tyson Foods' leadership page in 2025 and 2026; Wheeler's current status unconfirmed in Nov 2026
Information Security
Chief Information Security Officer, not named publicly
With Tyson Foods since 1997; has led information security since 2016
IT emerging tech, architecture and software engineering
Balaji Viswanath (as of Nov 2023)
Business unit IT
Adam Clark, IT for Fresh Meats, Poultry and Prepared Foods (as of Nov 2023)
Tyson Foods' technology chief has changed often. Scott Spradley was CTO from 2017 until Jan 2023; the CTO named in early 2023 left in Sep 2023, when Chief Information Officer Doug Kulka added the CTO title; Tyson Foods' FY2024 Form 10-K described a Chief Information & Technology Officer who joined in 2017 and took the role in 2023, and Kulka was still quoted with that title in Jul 2025. Tyson Foods' FY2025 Form 10-K describes a CTO who joined in 2013 and took the role in 2025, which matches Mike Wheeler. Tyson Foods' leadership page, checked Nov 1, 2026, lists five Enterprise Leadership Team members and no technology executive, and Wheeler's biography page no longer loads.
Where the AI workforce sits
Technology roles in the U.S. (Springdale, Arkansas and Waverly, Nebraska)
Estimate from open roles on Tyson Foods' technology job board on Nov 1, 2026, a hiring proxy, not a headcount; Tyson Foods does not publish where its technology staff sit.
~50%Technology roles in Bengaluru, India
Same Nov 1, 2026 job board estimate; mostly data engineering, data modeling and integration roles.
~25%Technology roles in Torreón, Mexico
Same Nov 1, 2026 job board estimate; the Torreón hub's senior engineers set standards for AI coding agents.
~20-25%
Named people
Use cases
Tyson Foods has not published a count of its AI use cases; the ones it has described run in plant operations (computer vision for product identification and quality control), energy (AI refrigeration controls at five facilities), product development (AI consumer insights), workforce communication (Tyson Translate and AI-assisted translation), supply chain planning, logistics and software development. Tyson Foods has published no business return it credits to AI for any of them: the one AI figure it reports, a 12-15% cut in site electricity at a 2024 refrigeration control pilot, is an energy measure at one facility with no cost attached. Tyson Foods reports no firm-level return on AI, and Donnie King said on May 4, 2026 that AI-driven consumer insights were improving innovation, distribution and pricing decisions without putting a figure on it.
| Use case | Area | Status | ROI |
|---|---|---|---|
| Computer vision for product identification and quality control Tyson Foods uses AI-enabled computer vision for automatic identification and quality control; a cross-functional team built machine learning models that identify products in-line, replacing a labor-intensive, error-prone pre-labeling operation. | Plant operations | In production | |
| AI refrigeration controls An AI control system tracks the electricity use of plant refrigeration and adjusts how the system runs; Tyson Foods piloted it at one facility in 2024, where its FY2025 Sustainability Report says the pilot showed a 12-15% overall reduction in site electricity consumption, including 22-28% in refrigeration electricity, and added four more U.S. locations in 2025. Tyson Foods has not put a cost figure on the reduction. | Energy and facilities | In production | |
| AI consumer insights and product testing Tyson Foods uses AI-driven insights to identify emerging consumer preferences and turn them into products, which Donnie King said in May 2026 informs its innovation pipeline, distribution and pricing decisions and marketing, as with the Jimmy Dean higher-protein breakfast line; King said in Aug 2026 that Tyson Foods had tested a number of products using agentic AI and would expand that work. | Marketing and product development | In production | |
| Tyson Translate Tyson Translate is an AI-powered speech translation tool for real-time conversations in 51 languages on any device, available to Tyson Foods team members worldwide from their first day. | Workforce | In production | |
| AI-assisted translation of training and surveys Tyson Language Services combines human translators with AI and machine learning to translate videos, voiceovers and enterprise-wide surveys into dozens of languages for a workforce that is more than 80% frontline. | Workforce | In production | |
| Demand forecasting and supply chain planning Tyson Foods built predictive capabilities to forecast consumption by 2020 and described advanced analytics for supply chain optimization in 2023; Oct 2026 postings seek engineers for demand planning, inventory optimization, production scheduling and S&OP work with Palantir Foundry and predictive models. | Supply chain | In production | |
| Autonomous box trucks with Gatik Gatik's autonomous refrigerated box trucks began running short, repeated routes from Tyson Foods plants to storage and distribution sites around Rogers and Springdale, Arkansas in Sep 2023, with a safety driver in the cab at first; Gatik still listed Tyson Foods as a customer in Aug 2026, and neither company has published an update on the Tyson Foods routes. | Logistics | Pilot | |
| AI coding agents and copilots Tyson Foods engineers encode standards, prompt templates and guardrails into AI coding agents so junior developers can work across the stack, and data engineers use AI copilots for code generation, debugging and documentation (Oct 2026 job postings). | Global Technology | In production | |
| SAP Joule assistant Tyson Foods is hiring a security engineer to architect secure integration of SAP's Joule AI capabilities across its SAP systems, so AI actions stay within each user's authorized privileges (Oct 2026). | Enterprise systems | Announced |
Adoption
Tyson Foods has spread AI unevenly across a workforce that is more than 80% frontline. Every Tyson Foods team member can use Tyson Translate from day one (FY2025), and Oct 2026 job postings say all professional team members are expected to use approved AI tools responsibly, integrate AI into daily work and validate AI-generated output, while people leaders are expected to drive responsible AI adoption; a digital marketing posting lists approved generative AI tools for content versioning and research. In plants, Tyson Foods' AI sits in specific systems: computer vision on lines since at least 2020 and AI refrigeration controls at five facilities by 2025; on the commercial side, AI-driven consumer insights feed product development (May 2026). Tyson Foods has not published how many employees use AI tools or how often.
By the numbers
Rollout, first pilot to today
Jun 2017
Tyson Foods hired Scott Spradley as Chief Technology Officer.
2019
Tyson Foods opened the Tyson Manufacturing and Automation Center in Springdale, with a vision technology lab, to develop automation and robotics for its plants.
Feb 2020
Tyson Foods outsourced part of its IT work to an unnamed global service provider, displacing about 330 IT employees, mostly in Springdale and Chicago.
Nov 2020
CEO Dean Banks and CTO Scott Spradley said Tyson Foods had consolidated onto a single enterprise platform and moved on to predictive capabilities and computer vision.
Jan 2023
Scott Spradley left Tyson Foods, which said its IT staff would take on his responsibilities with no immediate plan to fill the CTO post.
Sep 2023
Tyson Foods and Gatik began running autonomous refrigerated box trucks between Tyson Foods plants and storage sites in Northwest Arkansas.
Sep 2023
Chief Information Officer Doug Kulka added the Chief Technology Officer title after the CTO named earlier in 2023 left Tyson Foods.
Nov 2023
Tyson Foods technology leaders described proprietary machine learning and computer vision for in-line product identification and early generative AI deployments at the Northwest Arkansas Technology Summit.
2024
Tyson Foods piloted an AI refrigeration control system at one facility, cutting site electricity use by 12-15%.
Jun 2024
Former Cisco COO Maria Martinez joined the Tyson Foods board, and Chairman John H. Tyson said she would help the company expedite its data and digital initiatives.
2025
Tyson Foods added AI refrigeration controls at four more U.S. locations and brought its translation work under Tyson Language Services, including Tyson Translate for every team member.
2025
Mike Wheeler, a Tyson Foods finance executive, became Chief Technology Officer, leading the Global Technology organization.
Mar 2025
The Tyson Foods board's new Technology Committee held its first meeting on Mar 31, 2025.
Jul 2025
Tyson Ventures devoted Tyson Demo Day to AI in food innovation and branding, with 11 startups pitching and six advancing to talks with Tyson Foods businesses.
May 2026
Donnie King told analysts that Tyson Foods uses AI-driven insights to identify emerging consumer preferences in product innovation.
May 2026
Tyson Foods named Jeff Schomburger its next CEO, and Schomburger cited AI acceleration among his opportunities.
Aug 2026
Donnie King said Tyson Foods had tested a number of products using agentic AI and would expand that work.
Oct 2026
Tyson Foods job postings set the expectation that all professional team members use approved AI tools responsibly and validate AI-generated output.
Economics & controls
Spend and ROI
Technology budget
Tyson Foods does not disclose a technology or AI budget. Tyson Foods' research and development costs were $126 million in fiscal 2025, up from $106 million in fiscal 2024, and its FY2025 Form 10-K says that work covers product innovation, ingredient simplification, manual process automation in processing and grow-out operations, and breeding stock improvements. Tyson Ventures has invested more than $100 million since 2016 in emerging proteins and in technologies for food and worker safety (Jul 2025).
What AI itself costs
Tyson Foods has not disclosed what it spends on AI tools, models or compute, and AI spending does not appear in its earnings releases from Nov 2025 to Aug 2026.
Reported ROI
Tyson Foods has reported no business return it credits to AI, at firm level or for any use case. Tyson Foods' only published AI figure is an energy measure from its AI refrigeration control pilot: a 12-15% cut in site electricity use, including a 22-28% cut in refrigeration electricity, at one facility in 2024 (FY2025 Sustainability Report, Aug 2026); the report's callout labels the 12-15% figure as refrigeration electricity, while its text gives 12-15% for the whole site and 22-28% for refrigeration. Tyson Foods has not put a dollar value on the reduction or reported results from the four locations added in 2025. Donnie King said on Feb 2, 2026 that Tyson Foods is using more technology to be more efficient and is seeing the benefit, without naming AI or a figure, and said on May 4, 2026 that AI-driven consumer insights were improving distribution and pricing decisions, again without a figure.
Pay tied to data and digital
Tyson Foods' senior executive bonus plan for fiscal 2025 included an enterprise goal to deliver business unit data and digital planned projects, one of three non-financial goals that can each move payouts by up to 2.5% of target; together the three goals added a net 2.5% for fiscal 2025 (Dec 2025 proxy statement).
Headcount
Tyson Foods employed about 133,000 team members on Sep 27, 2025, down from about 138,000 a year earlier; Tyson Foods closed one beef and two prepared foods facilities in fiscal 2025 and announced further beef plant closures in Nov 2025 and Aug 2026. Tyson Foods has not tied any headcount change to AI.
Governance and risk
Board oversight
Tyson Foods' board created a Technology Committee that first met on Mar 31, 2025 and is chaired by former Cisco COO Maria Martinez; the committee oversees technology strategy and innovation, cybersecurity, compliance and IT operations, includes members of executive management, and works with the CTO and CISO (Dec 2025 proxy statement). Tyson Foods' Governance and Nominating Committee receives updates from the CISO and CTO on information security, data privacy and cybersecurity risk at least once a year (FY2025 Form 10-K).
Rules for employees
Tyson Foods expects all professional team members to use only approved AI tools, safeguard sensitive information, follow company policies and validate AI-generated output, and expects people leaders to drive responsible AI adoption and answer for the quality and accuracy of AI-supported work, according to standard language in its Oct 2026 job postings.
Controls on AI in core systems
Tyson Foods is building security for SAP's Joule AI so that AI actions run strictly within each user's authorized privileges, with Responsible AI controls that cover authentication, authorization, encryption, masking, content filtering and retrieval-augmented generation (Oct 2026 job posting). Tyson Foods' Google Cloud data platform applies column-level and row-level security and least-privilege access reviews.
Disclosed risks
Tyson Foods' FY2025 Form 10-K warns that new technologies such as artificial intelligence and quantum computing may present new technological risks or vulnerabilities, within its cybersecurity risk factor. Tyson Foods' information security program is led by a CISO who has been with the company since 1997 and has run security since 2016, reporting to the CTO.
Recent signals
Oct 4, 2026
Jeff Schomburger took over as President and CEO of Tyson Foods, succeeding Donnie King, who stays on the board.
Oct 2026
Tyson Foods job postings said all professional team members are expected to use approved AI tools responsibly, sought an engineer to secure SAP's Joule AI, and described a Torreón role that encodes engineering standards into AI coding agents.
Aug 27, 2026
Tyson Foods' FY2025 Sustainability Report said an AI refrigeration control pilot cut site electricity use by 12-15%, that the system had reached four more U.S. locations, and that Tyson Translate supports 51 languages for every team member.
Aug 3, 2026
Donnie King told analysts on the Q3 2026 call that Tyson Foods had tested a number of products using agentic AI and would expand that work, alongside digital tools that collect first-party consumer data.
Jun 8, 2026
Tyson Foods named Wes Morris Chief Operating Officer from Jun 15, 2026, overseeing the Chicken, Beef, Pork, Prepared Foods and International segments.
May 28, 2026
Tyson Foods named board member Jeff Schomburger its next CEO, effective Oct 4, 2026, and Schomburger said he would capitalize on emerging opportunities through AI acceleration.
May 4, 2026
Donnie King told analysts on the Q2 2026 call that Tyson Foods uses AI-driven insights to identify emerging consumer preferences, and that the capability was speeding innovation and improving distribution, pricing and marketing decisions.
Dec 17, 2025
Tyson Foods' proxy statement said the board's Technology Committee first met on Mar 31, 2025, and that executive bonuses carry a goal to deliver business unit data and digital projects.
Nov 10, 2025
Tyson Foods' FY2025 Form 10-K described its CTO, without a name, as with the company since 2013 and in the role since 2025, and listed artificial intelligence among technologies that may bring new cyber risks.
Quick answers
- How does Tyson Foods deploy AI?
- Tyson Foods deploys AI in specific operations rather than through a named company-wide platform: computer vision on plant lines, AI refrigeration controls at five facilities, AI consumer insights in product development, and Tyson Translate, an AI speech translation tool open to every team member. Tyson Foods has reported no business return it credits to AI, no count of AI users and no AI models or AI spending. Jeff Schomburger, CEO since Oct 4, 2026, cited AI acceleration as an opportunity in May 2026.
- What does Tyson Foods use AI for?
- Tyson Foods has not published a count of its AI use cases; the ones it has described run in plant operations (computer vision for product identification and quality control), energy (AI refrigeration controls at five facilities), product development (AI consumer insights), workforce communication (Tyson Translate and AI-assisted translation), supply chain planning, logistics and software development. Tyson Foods has published no business return it credits to AI for any of them: the one AI figure it reports, a 12-15% cut in site electricity at a 2024 refrigeration control pilot, is an energy measure at one facility with no cost attached. Tyson Foods reports no firm-level return on AI, and Donnie King said on May 4, 2026 that AI-driven consumer insights were improving innovation, distribution and pricing decisions without putting a figure on it.
- Who leads AI at Tyson Foods?
- AI at Tyson Foods is led by Mike Wheeler (Chief Technology Officer (from 2025)). Ownership of AI on the org chart: No named AI owner; Global Technology under a CTO (Mike Wheeler from 2025); board Technology Committee.
- What AI platform does Tyson Foods use?
- Tyson Foods has no named enterprise AI platform; its analytics run on Data@Tyson, built on Google Cloud BigQuery, with Palantir Foundry and SAP in its enterprise data architecture (Oct 2026 job postings).
- Which AI models does Tyson Foods use?
- Tyson Foods has not named a model vendor; it built its own machine learning and computer vision models for plant lines (Nov 2023) and is securing SAP's Joule AI assistant inside its SAP systems (Oct 2026 job posting).
- How many Tyson employees use AI?
- Tyson Translate, an AI speech translation tool in 51 languages, is open to every Tyson Foods team member from day one (FY2025), and Oct 2026 job postings expect all professional staff to use approved AI tools.
- How far has AI spread at Tyson Foods?
- Tyson Foods has reported no business return it credits to AI, which places it in Experimenting: its only published AI figure, a 12-15% cut in site electricity at one facility during a 2024 AI refrigeration control pilot (FY2025 Sustainability Report, Aug 2026), is a pilot energy measure with no cost figure, and Donnie King's May 2026 remark that AI-driven consumer insights were improving innovation, distribution and pricing decisions carried no number. Tyson Foods has not reported a company-wide AI rollout with a user count: Tyson Translate, an AI speech translation tool, is open to every team member with no usage figure, and Oct 2026 job postings expect professional staff to use approved AI tools without saying how many do. Tyson Foods falls short of Piloting because it has published no realized return credited to AI in any use case, such as a cost saving from the refrigeration controls now at five facilities, and has named neither an executive who owns AI nor how many of its roughly 133,000 employees use AI tools.
Open questions
- Does Mike Wheeler still lead Global Technology as Chief Technology Officer now that his biography is off Tyson Foods' leadership page, and whom does the CTO report to under Jeff Schomburger?
- Which approved AI tools and models do Tyson Foods' professional staff use, which vendors supply them, and where do those models run?
- How many Tyson Foods employees use AI tools, and how often?
- How much does Tyson Foods spend on technology and on AI, given that it discloses neither?
- What have the AI refrigeration controls saved in dollars, at the 2024 pilot and at the four locations added in 2025, which vendor supplies the system, and does the 12-15% pilot figure cover the whole site, as the FY2025 Sustainability Report's text says, or refrigeration alone, as its callout says?
- What business return, in cost, revenue or headcount, do Tyson Foods' deployed AI uses deliver, such as AI consumer insights, computer vision on plant lines, Tyson Translate, supply chain planning and AI coding agents?
- How many Gatik trucks run Tyson Foods routes, and have any of them gone driverless?
- Did any startups from Tyson Demo Day 2025, such as Orby AI, Qloo or Tastewise, move into pilots or contracts with Tyson Foods?
- What AI plan will Jeff Schomburger set out as CEO, and will Tyson Foods add AI targets to the data and digital goal in executive pay?
- Has Tyson Foods used AI to change staffing in plants, offices or IT, given that it has not tied any headcount change to AI?
Sources
Tyson Foods
- Leadership and Board of Directors
- Jeff Schomburger, President and CEO, biography
- Curt Calaway, CFO, biography
- Wes Morris, COO, biography
- Donnie King, director, biography
- Maria Martinez, director, biography
- Mike Wheeler, Chief Technology Officer, biography (in search results; no longer loading on Nov 1, 2026)
- Technology at Tyson Foods (careers)
- Tyson Ventures
- FY2025 Sustainability Report (Aug 27, 2026)
- Jeff Schomburger to succeed Donnie King as President and CEO (May 28, 2026)
- Tyson Foods names Wes Morris COO (Jun 8, 2026)
- Tyson Demo Day showcases AI innovations (Jul 14, 2025)
- Tyson Demo Day puts supply chain innovators center stage (Jul 24, 2024)
- Tyson Foods names Curt Calaway CFO (Aug 29, 2024)
- Former Cisco Systems executive Maria Martinez appointed to the board (Jun 12, 2024)
- New Bowling Green, Kentucky plant opens (Jan 25, 2024)
- New Danville, Virginia fully cooked plant opens (Nov 29, 2023)
- Tyson Foods and Gatik to deploy autonomous trucks (Sep 6, 2023)
- Donnie King to succeed Dean Banks as CEO (Jun 2, 2021)
- The Feed blog: Changing the future of food with automation and AI (Nov 14, 2023)
- The Feed blog: Northwest Arkansas Technology Summit, Dean Banks and Scott Spradley (Nov 13, 2020)
- The Feed blog: Animal welfare, robotics and automation (Nov 7, 2022)
Filings and investor materials
- FY2025 Form 10-K (filed Nov 10, 2025)
- FY2024 Form 10-K (filed Nov 12, 2024)
- Proxy statement (Dec 17, 2025)
- Form 8-K exhibit: CEO succession release (May 28, 2026)
- Form 8-K: Wes Morris appointed COO (Jun 8, 2026)
- Q3 fiscal 2026 results release (Aug 3, 2026)
- Fiscal 2026 outlook update (Sep 3, 2026)
- Q1 2026 earnings call transcript, The Motley Fool (Feb 2, 2026)
- Q2 2026 earnings call transcript (May 4, 2026)
- Q3 2026 earnings call transcript (Aug 3, 2026)
Tyson Foods job postings (Oct 2026)
- Senior Development Engineer, Torreón: AI coding agents
- Lead Cyber Security Engineer: SAP Joule AI security
- Lead IT Data Engineer: Data@Tyson on Google Cloud
- Lead IT Operations Developer: Google Cloud data platform
- Senior Development Engineer: Palantir Foundry and supply chain planning
- Staff Data Architect: enterprise data architecture
- Development Engineer II, full stack: predictive models and optimization
- Data Engineer I: AI copilots and large language models
- Digital Marketing Manager: approved generative AI tools
Partners
News
- Talk Business & Politics: Tyson Foods announces planned CEO change (May 2026)
- Talk Business & Politics: Tyson's chief technology officer exits (Jan 10, 2023)
- Meatingplace: Tyson names new CTO following exec departure (Sep 14, 2023)
- GlobalData: Tyson Foods executives, listing Mike Wheeler as CTO
- Talk Business & Politics: Tyson Foods outsourcing will displace 330 tech employees (Feb 27, 2020)
Data confidence
- Confirmed
- Stated in a primary or reputable public source.
- Estimated
- Derived or approximated from public reporting.
- Unconfirmed
- Reported, but not yet corroborated.
Tyson Foods profile · Enterprise AI diffusion report by Imagine · facts checked against their sources on Nov 1, 2026
