Computer Science Faculty Pitches Simple Diet Tracking App at 2024 SoCal Innovation Showcase

Mandy Korpusik, assistant professor of computer science, recently represented Loyola Marymount University at the 2024 SoCal Innovation Showcase. Presented by the Alliance for SoCal Innovation, this event brought together the brightest minds from top research institutions across Southern California to pitch early-stage breakthroughs in life science and technology to top-tier investors and successful serial entrepreneurs.

Korpusik, the founder and CEO of MealMate, focused her pitch presentation on the struggles researchers and subjects face when collecting diet data and her proposed solution: an app that uses MIT-patented artificial intelligence to simplify diet tracking.

Unlike typical diet tracking apps, MealMate has a nutrition chatbot which reduces the time, money, and frustration inflicted by manual data entry. Using artificial intelligence, it is sophisticated enough to understand food descriptions and provide personalized recommendations.

Korpusik began developing the AI technology for her thesis while in grad school at MIT. She wrote the software for the patent - the language understanding piece - using neural networks to learn vectors that represent food descriptions and vectors of all food titles in the USDA National Food Database.

"MealMate's evolution from a research project to a potentially world-class startup is a shining example of the innovation and entrepreneurship emerging from Southern California's academic institutions like LMU," Alliance for SoCal Innovation's Chief Operating Officer Steve Gilison says.

In the process of building her startup, Korpusik has tapped into LMU's network. She worked closely with executive MBA graduate Eric Speck to obtain seed funding from the National Science Foundation (NSF). Speck served as MealMate's chief program director and principal investigator. Bree Betts and Nick Morgan, LMU computer science alumni, worked as MealMate engineers, and Ari Kanevsky '24 interned with MealMate over the summer.

"The Alliance provides immense support for faculty innovation. Steve worked one-on-one with us to craft our pitch decks, and he continues to connect us with investors weeks after the event," Korpusik says.

She plans to go to market first with academic researchers before expanding to a consumer audience, and she already has signed letters of intent from Boston University, Emory University, and Florida International University. The showcase helped her expand her audience and has connected her to investors interested in her work.

"Through this showcase, the Alliance for SoCal Innovation has created an impactful platform for Southern California innovators," says Jody Skenderian, LMU's Executive Director of Strategic Partnerships & Initiatives and member of the Alliance for SoCal Innovation. "By bridging the academic community with the startup community, they are creating a path for essential research to expand beyond educational institutions into the minds of investors, entrepreneurs, and others in the innovation ecosystem."

Read more about Korpusik and her work:

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