SpatialCortex begins NSC MSD Solutions Pilot on site at Carolina Canners in Florence, South Carolina
SpatialCortex has started its National Safety Council (NSC) MSD Solutions Pilot with Carolina Canners, deploying MOVA MMH wearable sensors on site at the company’s Pepsi of Florence facility in Florence, South Carolina. Deployment began in August 2026. The pilot assesses musculoskeletal disorder (MSD) risk in two manual handling roles, warehouse material movers and short-haul delivery drivers, and runs across the NSC’s 2026–2027 grant cycle. Findings are scheduled to be presented at the 2027 NSC Safety Congress & Expo.
The project was one of five MSD Solutions Pilot awards issued this cycle, announced in June. This update covers the move from award to live deployment.
On-site deployment at Pepsi of Florence
The SpatialCortex team travelled to South Carolina in August to set up the pilot with the Carolina Canners EHS team. Participating material movers and delivery drivers were fitted with MOVA MMH sensor kits and briefed on how the sensors are worn during normal work, and data collection began in live operations on the warehouse floor and on delivery routes.
Because delivery drivers spend much of their day away from the depot, each kit is paired with a mobile device set up for US cellular networks, so assessment data can be uploaded from the route rather than only on return to site.
What the pilot will assess
The pilot focuses on the two task groups with the highest manual handling exposure: warehouse material movers and short-haul delivery drivers. Both involve well-established MSD risk factors, including repetitive lifting, twisting, reaching and carrying, often in changing environments where observation-based assessment is hard to apply consistently.
Carolina Canners will use the data to identify material handling risk factors and to evaluate whether targeted interventions reduce absence and injury rates.
For delivery drivers, the sensors record MSD risk factors alongside GPS location. This links specific risk events, such as a sustained awkward posture or a run of high-frequency lifting, to where and when they occur on a route, rather than treating delivery as a single, undifferentiated task.
The question the pilot is designed to answer is whether sensor data captured directly from the worker, independent of location or supervision, can give a safety team a reliable, task-level basis for prioritising interventions, instead of relying on periodic observation or self-report alone.
Why warehouse and delivery roles are hard to assess
In 2023–2024, the US private sector reported 937,620 MSD cases involving days away from work, restricted duty or job transfer, including 484,620 cases involving days away from work, according to NSC analysis of US Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) data. In 2023, transportation and warehousing, the sector these roles belong to, recorded a total recordable injury and illness rate of 4.5 cases per 100 full-time workers, against 2.4 across all private industry (BLS).
Delivery work changes from stop to stop. Loads, vehicle layouts, access at the customer site and time pressure all vary, so a single observed session or supervisor walk-through captures only part of a driver’s exposure, and placing an observer on every run isn’t practical. Warehouse roles carry a related problem: risk varies by task, pace and individual technique in ways that a job title or a sector-average injury rate can’t distinguish.
Sources: US Bureau of Labor Statistics, Survey of Occupational Injuries and Illnesses, 2023; National Safety Council analysis of BLS data, 2023–2024.
What is MOVA MMH?
MOVA MMH (Manual Material Handling) is SpatialCortex’s wearable biomechanical sensor system. Worn during real tasks, it captures posture and movement data and converts it into a structured, periodic assessment by role, rather than a single observed snapshot. The result is an objective, task-level picture of which postures and movements contribute most to MSD risk, giving safety teams a basis for deciding where to intervene and for checking whether an intervention has worked.
What happens next
Data collection continues through the grant cycle. The initial assessment will inform which interventions are introduced, and the same roles will then be reassessed to measure their effect. Findings from all MSD Solutions Pilot recipients are scheduled to be presented at the 2027 NSC Safety Congress & Expo, and SpatialCortex will share further updates as the project progresses.
About the National Safety Council MSD Solutions Lab
The National Safety Council (NSC) is a US non-profit safety organisation. Its MSD Solutions Lab, established in 2021 with funding from Amazon, funds research and pilot projects aimed at reducing workplace MSDs. Now in its fourth year, the programme has funded 35 projects and invested more than $1 million in practical, scalable approaches.
About Carolina Canners
Carolina Canners, Inc. is an independent Pepsi bottler and production cooperative based in Cheraw, South Carolina. Alongside its Cheraw production facility, it operates subsidiaries and three selling and distribution centres. According to the company, it employs approximately 600 people and distributes 28 million cases of drinks a year across the Carolinas and the Southeast.
About SpatialCortex
SpatialCortex is a UK workplace safety technology company helping organisations move from reactive to proactive MSD risk management. Its MOVA MMH wearable sensor system turns objective biomechanical data from real tasks into structured, role-level risk assessments, so safety teams can see which tasks and movements drive risk, target interventions where they matter most, and check whether those interventions are working.
To discuss MSD risk in your own warehouse or delivery operations, contact info@spatialcortex.co.uk.
Frequently asked questions
Where is the Carolina Canners MSD pilot taking place?
At Carolina Canners’ Pepsi of Florence facility in Florence, South Carolina, covering warehouse operations and short-haul delivery routes.
When did the pilot start?
On-site deployment began in August 2026. The pilot runs across the NSC’s 2026–2027 MSD Solutions Pilot Grant cycle.
Which roles does the pilot cover?
Warehouse material movers and short-haul delivery drivers.
Why does the pilot record GPS location for delivery drivers?
So that MSD risk events can be linked to specific points on a route. This lets risk be attributed to particular stops, deliveries or access conditions rather than to the delivery role as a whole.
When will the results be available?
Findings are scheduled to be presented at the 2027 NSC Safety Congress & Expo.
What is the NSC MSD Solutions Pilot Grant?
A grant of up to $20,000 for NSC MSD Pledge member organisations to test and evaluate MSD-reduction technologies and approaches in their own workplaces. It is part of the NSC’s MSD Solutions Lab, established in 2021 with funding from Amazon.
