An interview with Jason Cohen, founder of Analytical Flavor Systems, one of Forward Fooding’s top 500 Food Tech startups.

Jason Cohen, founder of Analytical Flavor Systems

It’s time to put a face to the name…

We asked our FoodTech 500 top-runners to give us a bit of insight into how they started out as a company and their thoughts on the role of technology in Food innovation. Meet Jason, the mastermind behind Analytical Flavor Systems, the company behind Gastrograph AI, the first AI platform to model human sensory perception of flavor, aroma, and texture to predict consumer preference. Let’s see what Jason had to say.

So tell us a little bit more about you! Where did the idea for your FoodTech company come from?

Jason: The idea to create a predictive platform to model the sensory perception of food and drink occurred to me while drinking a rare aged Pu Erh tea from the 1970s. Why can’t we make flavor predictive? I was studying machine learning and sensory science at the time at Penn State University. So I sat out to develop a sensory system called Gastrograph and began to collect data! We first started collecting data on tea, but it turns out drinking and evaluating the flavor of tea wasn’t as powerful of an intrinsic motivator as coffee for students on campus. Then, when we started evaluating beer, attendance and data collection no longer became an issue. With tens of thousands of reviews, the models began to converge and I realized that there were commercial applications for this technology and spun it out as an independent company. More than half a decade later we now have the largest sensory dataset in the world spanning over 24 countries, and work with some of the world’s largest food and beverage companies.

How is tech central to your business?

Jason: Technology is the core of our business as a machine learning and artificial intelligence company.

Why do you think it’s important to see the food industry embrace tech?

Jason: Tech is changing the world and will have profound aspects on all businesses. It’s important that the food industry is proactive in vetting and adopting the latest technologies to give them an edge over their competitors.

Want to know more? Check out Analytical Flavor Systems’ full profile here.

Congratulations again to Analytical Flavor Systems for ranking 5th in the “Consumer Apps & Services” category of the Foodtech 500 list.

To find out who else made it into the FoodTech 500; the top Food Tech companies in the world, click here.

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