By Zach Winn

Dairy farmers around the world have an information problem. To get the most accurate measurements of cow health and milk quality, many have to ship milk samples to labs or wait for a technician to come to the farm to collect milk samples from each cow.

Now Labby, a startup founded by two MIT alumni, is helping farmers get a clearer picture of their cows’ health with a device that can test milk from individual cows in less than 10 seconds.

Labby’s device sits at the front of an analytics platform that can help farmers detect diseases before they spread to the rest of the herd. Down the line, it could also give veterinarians historical health data on specific animals, help dairy farmers identify best practices, and allow farmers to increase transparency with consumers.

Everyone understands the power of data to improve health,” says Labby CEO Julia Somerdin SDM ’13, who cofounded the company with former MIT Media Lab postdoc Anshuman Das. “It’s just like how home care and [data collection devices] for humans have transformed health care.”