July 11, 2025 • 38 mins
“We built Vinst to help people cook better, together.” 👩🍳👨🍳
Assaf Glazer, Vinst's CEO & Co-Founder and a self-described foodie, shares the app's origin story rooted in pandemic parenting. During COVID lockdowns in New York, watching his three young children consume processed foods pushed him to dedicate kitchen time to fresh, home-cooked meals. This practice sparked an idea: what if technology could make cooking more accessible and enjoyable without introducing more complications?
"Technology today changed dramatically the way that we cook," Glazer explains. "We enter the kitchen with our phone - it's our browser, timer, calculator, chat, notes. We have our cameras. We don't need to be next to our parents for 20 years and learn how to cook."
Yet this technological bounty creates its own problem - a disjointed cooking experience with information scattered across multiple platforms.
Vinst solves this by consolidating everything cooking-related into one minimalist interface. The app extracts recipe information from links, images, and text, organizing everything into searchable, shareable collections.
What makes Vinst particularly fascinating is its approach to food as a form of connection. The app enables collaborative cookbooks where families can preserve traditions and friends can share discoveries.
"We call what we do in the kitchen a food story," Glazer shares. "You bring your inspiration, your smells, the bloggers, mom, whatever to the table and to the kitchen, and you cook as you do it with your oven and your things and your taste... and eventually something different is made that is yours."
Looking ahead, Vinst aims to revolutionize cooking through personalized nutrition. Future updates will incorporate health data from wearables and lab tests to provide weekly feedback on how your cooking affects your wellbeing. The app will suggest recipe modifications based on your health needs, dietary restrictions, budget, and locally available ingredients.
Ready to transform your kitchen experience? Download Vinst and discover how AI can help you cook better, connect deeper, and eat healthier.
Download the app:
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Steven (00:01):
Welcome to the Four Worlds podcast from Tomorrow's
World.
Today, we're diving into thelatest in tech, science and
sustainability, from nature'smysteries and the world of
inspiration to the hands-oncrafts of creation, the bold
breakthroughs of innovation andthe scaled-up wonders of
production.
This is your ticket to thestories shaping tomorrow.
(00:22):
Welcome back, everyone, toanother episode of the Four
Worlds podcast.
We have another excitingepisode for you.
Today.
We're joined by Asaf Glazer,the CEO of the Vinst app.
Really, in essence, it's an appthat makes cooking easier,
making your time in the kitchena little more enjoyable, all
(00:44):
using AI technology and, ofcourse, an app Aesop.
Thank you so much for joiningus.
How are you?
Asaf (00:51):
I'm good.
I'm good.
Thanks for the invite.
It's a pleasure.
Steven (00:54):
Yeah, the pleasure is all ours.
We're definitely lookingforward to this one, so let's
jump right into it.
What is the Vinst app and wheredid it start?
Take us all the way back to thebeginning, where you're
brainstorming and coming up withthat idea, finally getting into
the product that you have now.
Asaf (01:17):
Yes, the Vinst app is your partner for cooking at home.
Prioritize it based on the painpoint that we found by looking
at people cooking at homewhether to organize all your
recipes together in one place,have an easy-to-follow display,
being able to collaborate andshare recipes, which you know,
cooking starts with inspiration,not only our mom and dad, but
(01:41):
also bloggers today.
So how to bring all of thistogether into one place with a
vision to improve our healththrough home cooking over time,
with Finst.
Steven (01:51):
You know, cooking, just like you said, has a lot to do
with inspiration.
But getting this app launched,getting it started, what
inspired you to do that?
What was that point in yourhead that just gave you that aha
moment and made you want to gotoward something like this?
Asaf (02:07):
First, I'm a foodie guy.
Ok, I like to cook.
I used to be in kitchens and ateenager and later on.
But what made the differencewas COVID, and during COVID I
was three kids and we were inNew York during this time with
(02:27):
three young kids at home allover and cooking started to be a
necessity because they couldn'tstand watching my kids eating
those.
I say, yeah, double-crossedchicken fingers.
So I put like a two-hour slotsin the car in there and the rest
is a story.
What cooking did to my family,not only from nutrition
(02:51):
perspective, but also get toknow your kid and something for
their future.
Many things to say about it.
But this was, this is themoment that everything started.
Steven (03:03):
Yeah, Was there ever a moment, on the other hand, too,
where you're looking throughrecipes you're looking online
different things, maybe someblogs, just recipes in general
Was there that moment where youthought to yourself there has to
be an easier way or on a moreefficient way to do this?
Asaf (03:21):
I'm dealing with AI, vision, computer vision, process
control and consumer from verydifferent angles.
Along the year and in 2020, Istarted to dive into the
articles that talk aboutmultimodal with AI and it was
mind-blowing.
(03:41):
We went through the deeplearning revolution and Gen AI
is kind of the next phase ofthis one.
But the ability to take contentlike liquid images and text and
video and fuse them in a waythat creates reasoning and be
able for a machine to digestthis data it changed the whole
(04:08):
paradigm of how people cook,because I can provide you the
information exactly how you wantit.
If you want it to look likeshorts on YouTube, then this is
how it looks.
Like the technology wasn'tthere yet in terms of production
, but it was clear that we cando much more than having with
(04:30):
our phone in the kitchen cooking.
Steven (04:33):
So talking about all of that and we'll take a glimpse
behind the curtain a littlelater but if you're a user on
the Vinst app, you open it, youcreate an account.
But if you're a user on theVinst app, you open it, you
create an account.
What can people do?
Kind of a step-by-step of allof the capabilities.
I mean there's links you canput onto the app that'll give
you a recipe.
(04:53):
There's videos, like you said,even pictures Give us kind of
like a step-by-step what a usercan expect when opening the
Vinst app when opening the Vinstapp.
Asaf (05:03):
When you open the Vinst app, you get first a list of all
your recipes that are in thesame format, saved in one
location.
Like technology today, even ifit takes 10 years ago, changed
dramatically the way that wecook.
We enter the kitchen with ourphone, we cook our browser timer
, calculator, chat notes.
(05:25):
We have our cameras, we wedon't need to be next to our
parents for 20 years and learnhow to cook.
We just open instagram andtiktok and everything goes uh to
you in a one-to-many approach,and it changed dramatically the
way that people learn and cook.
But if you look at theexperience of how it feels to
(05:46):
cook with everything around, itis at least joint experience.
It's all over, the screenturned off and the images are
lost in the camera rolls andthere is recipes on Instagram
and recipes in WhatsApp threadswith friends and not everything
and pop-up from advertisementand it's like Windows 95, like
(06:08):
the promise is there.
The promise is there, thetechnology is working, but there
is some missing brand andalignment on voice and tone and
some guidance of puttingeverything together without the
need to go to the timer or toGoogle or to translate or to
look at weird recipes, or scrollall the way down and to see
(06:31):
where the hell are theinstructions, or just being able
to keep in one place everythingand never go and search your
recipes in other places, and, ontop of it, being able to
collaborate and create sharedcollections with your family and
with cooking clubs and friendsand community.
(06:53):
And everything that I saiduntil now is free.
So our basic assumption is that,in order to make such an
improvement in the way thatpeople cook, there are various
studies that show that homecooking translates to better
nutrition practices.
It is the journey, the factthat you control the ingredients
(07:15):
and be aware of what you put inyour mouth.
It's like putting yourself on ascale every morning.
Eventually, you will loseweight.
So if we will make home cookingeasier and allow everyone to do
those, things will be alsobetter uh nutrition for all.
Uh.
So if you want to create suchan impact and being able to
(07:37):
share between everyone, it mustbe free.
So the thing that related tothis uh is uh, that on this part
, we're pretty unique.
Steven (07:47):
Yeah, it definitely makes you unique because
everything is down to a paywallthese days.
So, having you know, Idownloaded the app myself.
I was looking around to it andjust the capabilities that you
have in the app to make cookingeasier, to make it a little more
accessible and it being free,is really unique to the app.
(08:09):
So I completely agree with youon that front.
And to do all of that, youreally leverage into AI,
artificial intelligence.
So how do you use AI to makeall of these processes easier
for a user?
Asaf (08:23):
AI is like electricity.
It's not a product.
You know GPT, can you knowelectricity like you go straight
to GPT.
There is a lot of value aroundcopy, but you can feed a lot of
products and create amazingthings.
So how AI is plugged intoVINCED in a way that help us
(08:43):
cook is in every detail aroundthe app.
We use electricity and we useAI.
First, when you bring yourrecipes from Instagram text or
images or URLs online, weextract the data with AI and
provide you all the recipesorganized and categorized,
(09:06):
auto-categorized so if you wantto find recipes by meal type or
ingredients or dessert or typeof cuisine and we have lots of
type of categorization you caneasily go and find them and
search them in a really easy way, in a really easy way.
Not to mention that when youcook those recipes, that the
(09:26):
view is very structured and youcan see all the recipes in the
same way.
The screen is always on.
We have, of course, our GPT andyou can ask questions, but also
the timers are ready for you inadvance, so you don't need to
go anywhere outside the app todo things whether to write notes
and if you take pictures, weactually add them to the app to
do things, whether to writenotes, and if you take pictures,
(09:46):
we actually add them to the appitself.
We also allow you to puttogether playlists of recipes in
a collection.
It's really nice curatedcollections that you have on
your collections tab and thosecollections can also be shared
with others and create acollaborative collections with
friends or with families, whichis very unique in the way that
(10:10):
you can actually share and dothings together and just make
your cooking experience mucheasier.
The optional side, which iswhat we are selling, is we can
turn those collections intoself-published cookbooks that
you can use for gifting aspecial gift for Thanksgiving or
(10:35):
a special event like graduation.
We had now a scout that everychild gave one recipe and they
bought 20 kind of books forgraduations that all the
families received or justpreserving family recipes,
(10:55):
thinking about your mom, dad,their recipes, their friends and
putting it together, and itcould be a really nice project
to cherish those traditions andbring back those recipes to the
table and helping us cook easily, collaboratively and easily,
(11:15):
eventually, with VINCED.
Steven (11:17):
And that's one of another unique thing about the
app.
It's, of course, on it at the,at face value.
It's about cooking, it's makingaccessing recipes easier, but
it really is about connectingpeople, right.
Whether it's through thecreation of your own cookbook,
sharing recipes with otherfriends, family members, is that
(11:41):
something that was important toyou?
Obviously, you told the storyabout COVID and cooking for your
children and all that Isconnecting family and friends.
One of the more importantthings about the Vinst app as
well.
Asaf (11:51):
Definitely.
I can give you an example.
I think that today we can talkabout it.
We really look at from if yougo 30,000 feet up, okay, we look
at the food system.
We look at the food systemthough.
We spend a significant amountof time to look at it not only
from recipe perspective, butalso from industry, culinary
(12:16):
food science, going to evenprocessed food, looking into the
academia and how they look atit.
I myself spent like one year ina cooking school and working in
a fine dining restaurant as acook just to feel how a kitchen,
professional, kitchen work.
But a lot of those are wherethe thought leaders are defining
(12:39):
culinary right.
When you look at the food systemas a whole from many different
perspectives, you understandthat what you want to do for our
food system to be better areactually the reason why we cook
at home.
We want to make our food systemmore connecting more.
It's a way to express love youcook the food you love very
(13:01):
emotional, and it's a way toexpress love you cook the food
you love very emotional, andit's a way to to bring people
together.
And we wanted to be healthierour food system.
We wanted to use less resourcesand we want us to be friendly
to the environment.
These are why people cook.
You cook the food you love forthe people you love, you, you
cook.
(13:21):
I discovered last year that twoof my kids have celiac, so
health turned a very drasticshift for me.
But health and wellness is oneof the reasons we cook at cost
and the environment, and thoseare the reasons.
So let's cook.
If you want to make our foodsystem better, then let's cook.
And the first thing that Italked about was about
(13:43):
connection, about those people,and we call what we do in the
kitchen.
We call it a food story, in thesense that you know, you bring
your inspiration, your smells,the bloggers, mom, whatever to
the table and to the kitchen andyou cook as you do it with your
(14:04):
oven and your things and yourtaste and your spicy and your
hands, and eventually somethingdifferent is made that is yours.
This is your food story.
So how can you create such atool without sharing and
collaborating?
Because this is how we learnhow to cook.
(14:28):
If you look at where it startedand where it goes, it's all
summed into making cookingeasier, but also education, for
(14:54):
instance, farm-to-table.
Farm-to-table is one of thebasic things to learn when you
cook at home, because if I willtell you to cook healthy which
is logic, probably it won't lastbeyond a few weeks.
But if I will give you ways tomake your food tastier or make
it cheaper and make it morefresh and healthy, then you will
do it.
And how we can tie?
Or how can you usecollaboration and sharing to
(15:14):
teach people about farm-to-table, about local ingredients, about
even support your local farms?
Just share with them recipesthat are relevant for the season
.
We are now starting to.
We're in collaboration with Ican say it now with West
Virginia University.
(15:35):
It's still not in place, so wegot here kind of news and we
created for them a collection, ashareable cookbook, that
shareable collection of recipesthat feature fruits, that and
vegetables that now grow inVirginia during the summer.
(15:55):
And those are only simplerecipes, easy to cook, less than
30 minutes.
Just try to replace thoseshakes and things that they buy
and say you know, we have greatfruits, it will be tasty, it's
less than half a dollar perperson.
And try, through behavioralscience, to bring those people
(16:18):
to cook more and to acquirebetter nutrition habits over
time.
You cannot do it withoutcollaborating.
Steven (16:28):
Yeah, no, that makes sense.
How does that translate to thehome?
Maybe someone doesn't haveaccess to a quote farm to table
kind of situation.
Uh, they're in the city.
How does it translate?
Can you ask the app or thechatbot to find a replacement?
What can I do?
I'm not near a farm, I'm notnear, uh, fresh produce.
(16:50):
Essentially, how can I replacethat?
What can I do to make my recipea little more nutritional, a
little bit more better for me?
Asaf (16:58):
it is a really good question.
I think that I was alwayssurprised how the number one
go-to for cooking is New YorkTimes.
They really have the bestrecipes.
But no matter where you are inthe world, you are cooking the
same recipe.
But you know there are seasonsand I you know personally myself
(17:22):
, I need a gluten-free nutritionand I want low fat or I want
something quick and easy.
With AI, you can make thosechanges.
So, no matter where you're inthe world, with VINCED we can
adjust recipes to your taste andalso to your local environment
(17:47):
and your local ingredients thatyou had before.
Like, we're looking intoprecision nutrition.
When you look at Vinst, youknow now we just launched that
this year.
We just started and the app isgrowing in a really high pace.
But if you look at where we'regoing, we want to also get
(18:07):
feedback from your Apple Watch,your blood test, your sleep, and
every week we'll give you somebiofeedback of how the food that
you ate affected your health.
And with precision nutritionand AI, we can actually modify
those things to adjust to yourtaste, to your diet restrictions
(18:32):
, to your busy schedule, to yourwhatever budget that you have.
So if you are in New York,instead of having long hauls of
potato breads and chickennuggets from America.
You're next to the sea.
You're next to the sea Eat fish.
This is my message.
You know, I was in Japan thisspring with my family and I had
(18:59):
a nice, kind of nice place thatI rented, with a kitchen because
I felt that I need to cook inthe morning, and I was surprised
that everything is fresh.
Like everywhere that you go,everything is so fresh and so
clean.
And you go to the supermarket,there are no carts, there are
only small baskets, and you seethat people in Japan all the
(19:23):
industries farm to table Likethey don't consume almost.
They don't have frozen meals,they don't have this.
You won't see this in thesupermarket and every time they
eat or buy the things that arefresh and local, go back home
and then the price is also lower.
We just need to understand whatour land around us gives us,
(19:46):
and this is an example of thedirections that we're going.
Steven (19:50):
Yeah, and you brought up a good point with the frozen
meals.
Let's say someone who can'tcook, they rely on those frozen
meals.
Let's say they have XYZ frozenmeal.
Can they go into your app andsay hey to the chatbot, give me
a maybe identical, a similarrecipe to this frozen meal.
(20:12):
Will the app give maybe a morenutritional option for it?
A recipe, a simple recipe for,let's say, a frozen meal.
Asaf (20:21):
We're going in this direction.
We have some certain tweaks andwe have a recipe tweaker I can
share with you.
It's something that we'reworking now with the academia to
understand what type ofprecision nutrition would be.
We're also looking intoresearch.
I don't know how much you knowabout Nenit, my previous company
(20:42):
that I founded, but Nenit is aconsumer product that helps
parents put their baby to sleep.
It's a baby monitor that yousell on the market and everyone
knows that I'm talking aboutparents.
But on the back end, our firstinvestor were Cornell and
Technion University.
Our first investors wereCornell and Technion University
(21:10):
and we created a platform forresearchers to expand our
knowledge on baby sleep anddevelopment.
From early detection of autismwith UCLA and Autism Speak to
dozens of journal papers, peerreview, we became the gold
standard of how to measure sleepoutside of the lab.
Then it went through avalidation studies for the sleep
scoring technology.
When you are thinking about itas a whole, you know we move now
from sleep to nutrition.
We can go into groups and likediabetics and think about okay,
(21:36):
how to support diabetics andallow them to do all the
low-glochemium turn every recipeto low-glochemium version using
VINs.
It is a huge lots of population, like lots of types of
different of that you need tounderstand.
We cannot boil the ocean interms of the opportunity that
(21:58):
exists out there, but I thinkthat AI created a product for
100 years, like electricity, soat some point we'll reach there.
Steven (22:11):
So that brings up a great point talking about Nana
and we're jumping around alittle bit here.
But how did Nana and foundingthat inspire or help you create
VINCED and the earliest stagesof VINCED?
Take us through that timelineof NANA and then going into
VINCED?
Asaf (22:28):
For me there's a really smooth transition between
everything.
I started in semiconductors I'mtalking about 2004, ddi and we
(22:49):
tried with a neural network,classified defects on silicon
wafer as part of theclassification process and it
was process control and I loveprocesses, I like to measure
everything and I moved fromthere to like I did my thesis
around it and I was working on aproduct that I was on the
(23:10):
algorithm side.
I was only kind of and I wastrying to do process control for
flowers and for textile and forPCB and for vegetables, and
then I moved to my PhD andstarted to do process control
for babies.
A crib is like a chamber.
It turned into a consumerproduct.
But if you look at the initialhow Nanny started, it called and
(23:30):
told Nanny how to identifydiseases and disorders earlier
with a camera.
It wasn't even about a screen.
I moved as a postdoc to CornellUniversity with this concept to
commercialize it maybe, but Ithink that we improve Dr Cornell
University with this concept.
To commercialize it maybe, butI think that we improve or we do
sleep training and help parentsput their baby to sleep and
(23:50):
through the data that weaggregate, we tell something
about sleep and developments forkids and also for parents here
with VINCED.
It's the same vision.
Through home cooking from aweekly basis, we do some
behavioral change as well, withthose feedback that we'll
provide you on a weekly basis,with this kind of biofeedback,
(24:15):
with how we educate you aboutfarm-to-table through emotions
and incentive.
We did all those things withNenit and with Nenit we also
work closely with Academia.
Academia is, I think, thepartnership between industry and
Academia can bring to greatbusinesses and amazing social
(24:38):
impact, and this is a joint rolethat academia and industry have
and I can talk a lot only aboutthis because I was only on the
same.
But we use the academia tounderstand what is belief and
what is science.
Like, parents have a lot ofways to put their baby to sleep,
lots of beliefs and everythingis good.
(24:58):
You know we cannot, cannot.
You know if you feel something,always leave right with your
hearts, but as a company, as abrand, you need to be
responsible.
So we uh, the president of thetechnion was of the founders of
sleep medicine and we connectedwith the top leaders on baby
sleep and development and one ofthem was professor.
Obviously I won't go into allthe details, but I need to say
(25:21):
this name.
So what should we do now to putbaby to sleep?
Studies show that.
We're looking for evidence.
There is an evidence that homecooking improves your health.
There is evidence about whathappens when you consume food
from local environment.
(25:41):
If you consume home cookinguntil age of five, there are a
lot of studies that show thatless chances that you'll develop
celiac, for instance and we canuse the research in VINCED our
connection to them in a way thatwill help us to make an impact,
significant impact, on ournutrition eventually.
Steven (26:07):
Right and going from Nanit into Vince.
Both are using technology andscience and blending that with
people's very personal livesmaybe some very personal moments
, Maybe some very personalmoments.
And let's go to Vince.
You're accessing some photosfrom recipes or food and cooking
with people's very personallives.
(26:28):
How do you balance thatinnovation and setting yourself
up in these people's personallives?
How do you balance thatinnovation and people's very
personal moments?
Asaf (26:40):
Yeah, I don't see any problem around it.
Steven (26:43):
Actually.
Asaf (26:43):
I'm always amazed how consumers are not logical in the
way that they work.
It's not like I save money, soI do this.
B2b is much more easier tounderstand before even you went
to scale With people.
The challenge is understandinghow the data, how the statistic
(27:08):
overall it's a problem that youmust look at numbers, you must
look at feedback.
You cannot say what is, andthose things personal things and
fact that you see that are likea hum moment, shape your
product and it's probably theonly way to shape your product
(27:30):
Smart people that sit in a roomand think about the product
eventually, if they won't use it.
Listen to the users, have themhear what they want.
It's not that they need to makethe decision.
You have the strategy andunderstand.
But going into those personaldetails, this is the way to
create value every time Right,and how do you take user
(27:52):
feedback?
Steven (27:53):
Do you take that heavily into consideration and what has
that feedback been from usersusing the Vinst app?
Asaf (28:01):
As an analog, it's like going to a kindergarten and
trying to develop first grade.
So they don't know to read yet,right, but you're just trying
to understand how to bring themto first grade.
You need to work with them.
They don't make changes intheir life until there is a
(28:22):
really good reason.
If you will download the appand you won't be able to log in,
you will throw it and you won'tcontinue.
If I will ping you to downloadthe app, you will ask me how do
I fix it right?
So the user journey needs to besmooth and there is a lot of
details when you look at thisfunnel of bringing people to
(28:44):
become users, and the way to doit is just observing.
The first thing that we did wasto go to people's home and see
how they cook.
We did many, many surveysaround the US to understand how
kitchens look like, how peoplecook, how frequently they cook,
(29:04):
how do they do it, what are theyand, based on the data they
aggregate you cannot, by the way, measure everything but your
service or anything.
Well, do you have some uhinstincts around something?
It's not, and eventually theydon't know what the book is and
I know where I'm taking them.
So, uh, it's not that it'severything what the user are
(29:27):
doing, but you're using datafrom them to make informed
decisions on your productroadmap and what were some of
those when you're firstlaunching Vinst?
Steven (29:36):
what were some of those hurdles or maybe some challenges
that you had to overcome, andhow did you overcome them?
Asaf (29:43):
to overcome and how did you overcome them?
I think that the biggestchallenge was understanding how
to deal with uncertainty aroundAI, because from the early
beginning, we said you know youcan talk to your phone and ask
them how to solve this problemwith a dishwasher and should
have a video of you know theBosch CEO telling you how to fix
(30:07):
that dishwasher.
You know this is where theworld is going right, but
creating such a solution fromintegration, from production
perspective, take time a year,two years.
So we want to move really,really fast, but we need to
create a technology strategyroadmap that would say where to
(30:31):
put things along the way.
And it's not only by the waywhen the technology arrives,
it's also a moment in time.
For instance, we saw that whenpeople create a book for their
family, for instance, thebiggest challenges for them is
to bring images.
You know it's there.
My mom took this Like I don'thave it now and or like it's a
(30:56):
hustle, like you cook.
Sometimes you forget to takepictures because you're so
hungry and you want to dosomething and you just don't
think about it.
So why don't we do an imagewith AI?
And we found out that it reallyworked.
But there was a question whetherthe sentiment around it will be
positive or negative, and whatwe found?
(31:19):
That in some sense, when wetalk about AI, we pass the
Rubicon.
Everyone wants to be part of it.
There was a point in time thateveryone left their Nokia phone
and moved to iPhone, crossingthe chasm you know the layers of
the world.
We realized that we are thereand we're fine with generating
(31:42):
AI images, because you want tosee the real recipe.
You don't want to see an AIgenerated images, but making all
in all, it's better thannothing and it looks also really
good when you print it.
I recommend all of you to seehow good it is.
Steven (32:02):
What does the team behind vince uh product look
like?
Is there uh developers?
Is there cooks all going intothe the same product?
Asaf (32:12):
first I have my co-founder and fisher, and he used to be
my vp, svp of rnd at nenit.
At nenit we'll build a computervision on the cloud with real
time on firmware, hardwaremanufacturing, manufacturing,
mobile.
He orchestrated all thisoperation and he's also a pastry
chef.
So after working a decadetogether, we moved to this
(32:37):
journey.
So first I have my co-founder,and this is the beginning.
My first hire was designresearch, also with Nanit in New
York.
By the beginning, my first hirewas design research, also with
NENET in New York.
By the way, understanding andobservation and conduct
qualitative and quantitativestudies, being able to interview
, being able to look into dataand drive conclusions.
(33:00):
I don't believe in luck.
I believe that first youmeasure and then you make
decisions.
So first measure what is notknown and then you'll be able to
move forward.
So design is a big part.
But then you have developers,you have culinary experts.
We are all kind of foodies.
If you will download the app,on the collections tab you will
(33:24):
see a collection that was madeby the Vince team.
So if you want to know thembetter, you got the recipes from
their home so you can go thereand each one have my grandma
pickles, which are the bestpickles ever, and what is nice
about pickles?
That you need only pickles andsalt.
(33:44):
That is not only cheap butavailable everywhere and you can
have your really fresh, nicepickles for yourself but many
other great recipes that you canenjoy.
If you want to know the teambetter.
Steven (33:59):
No, that's great.
I saw the pickles.
When I first downloaded the app, I saw the other recipes that
are already available to a user,which I find very interesting
because it does ease a user in.
When you open the app, it's nota blank page.
You already have a dozen or sorecipes right at your fingertips
(34:20):
.
Is that something that you tookinto consideration when
developing?
Asaf (34:23):
Yes, we started with the pain points.
The pain points were theorganization.
I think that there are a lot ofsites and whatever that feels
like an e-commerce for recipesthat you get lost.
Vince's app is very minimalistin the design.
We can bring you a lot ofrecipes.
We can generate recipes, we canbut the first pain point is
(34:46):
bring yours.
You find something on Instagram, just throw it to Vince.
Just click the share, throw itto Vince and you don't need to
think about it.
It's already there.
We will process, we willextract, we'll make it available
in the best way for you to cookit once you want it.
Steven (35:03):
And looking towards the future.
Where do you see Vinst goingand what's your ultimate goal?
Moving forward.
Asaf (35:10):
We want to make our food system better and we want to
make it through home cooking.
I think that we entered thisbig party of probably the
largest market in the world 10%of global economy and we try to
be partners for the people athome that cook in helping them
to go through it in the easiestway.
(35:32):
Education is a big part of itand I think that education with
generative AI what I told youbefore you can ask Julia Child
to make you a French onion soup,and she will be there with you
and instruct you before.
You can ask Julia Child to makeyou a French onion soup, and
she will be there with you andinstruct you with what you are
doing and show you how to cutthe onion that you actually have
in your hand.
(35:53):
That technology is not there interms of production, but it
will be there.
It's just a matter of time.
So we design for this futureand think about like a Spotify
for recipes in some way.
Steven (36:08):
I love that comparison Sharing with friends, creating a
playlist playlist in quotes ofrecipes, which is really great.
So it's definitely wait and seewhat technology looks like, and
Vince will be right there,adapting and expanding with it.
Asaf (36:23):
Yes, there, adapting and expanding with it.
Yes, and the research part, ofcourse, working with the data
and measure what the food thatwe eat, how it affects our
community, how it affects ourhealth, how it affects our
resources.
We can correlate it's kind ofan FDA process even of things
(36:44):
that and you look at it a largeway, but there is still a long
way to be there.
Steven (36:52):
Absolutely, and we're looking forward to following
that journey as you move forwardinto the future.
Now, as we wrap things up, isthere anything else that you
wanted to add, anything that wemight've missed, that you'd want
a potential user to know?
Whether it's an amateur chef ora professional chef, anyone can
use the vinst app and maybe Ican send you the recipe tweaker.
Asaf (37:14):
Yeah, uh, you don't need to download the vinst app to use
it.
It's a website but you can useit to take whatever recipe you
have, whether it's from mom orfrom blogger or whatever.
Put the URL to paste it insideand tweak it in a way that you
want to be with less sugar, lesseasy to make.
(37:35):
As an example of the thingsthat you can do with AI and
really easily get the recipe asyou want to cook with Could be
helpful for many of the audiencewho cook at home.
Steven (37:49):
Well, asaf, I appreciate that.
We'll definitely try to getthat out there and, once again,
I just can't thank you enoughfor jumping on, taking the time
out of your day and joining us.
This was a lot of fun.
Asaf (37:59):
Thank you.
Thank you for the time.
It was a pleasure.
Steven (38:01):
Absolutely.
That's all the time we havetoday.
We look forward to anotherepisode.
We'll see you next time.
Thanks for listening to thisepisode of the Four Worlds
Podcast.
Until next time, you can catchup on the latest innovations
shaping our world atTomorrowsWorldTodaycom.
Follow us on Facebook andInstagram, and be sure to
(38:23):
subscribe to our YouTube channel.
Welcome to the Four Worlds podcast from Tomorrow's
World.
Today, we're diving into thelatest in tech, science and
sustainability, from nature'smysteries and the world of
inspiration to the hands-oncrafts of creation, the bold
breakthroughs of innovation andthe scaled-up wonders of
production.
This is your ticket to thestories shaping tomorrow.
(00:22):
Welcome back, everyone, toanother episode of the Four
Worlds podcast.
We have another excitingepisode for you.
Today.
We're joined by Asaf Glazer,the CEO of the Vinst app.
Really, in essence, it's an appthat makes cooking easier,
making your time in the kitchena little more enjoyable, all
(00:44):
using AI technology and, ofcourse, an app Aesop.
Thank you so much for joiningus.
How are you?
Asaf (00:51):
I'm good.
I'm good.
Thanks for the invite.
It's a pleasure.
Steven (00:54):
Yeah, the pleasure is all ours.
We're definitely lookingforward to this one, so let's
jump right into it.
What is the Vinst app and wheredid it start?
Take us all the way back to thebeginning, where you're
brainstorming and coming up withthat idea, finally getting into
the product that you have now.
Asaf (01:17):
Yes, the Vinst app is your partner for cooking at home.
Prioritize it based on the painpoint that we found by looking
at people cooking at homewhether to organize all your
recipes together in one place,have an easy-to-follow display,
being able to collaborate andshare recipes, which you know,
cooking starts with inspiration,not only our mom and dad, but
(01:41):
also bloggers today.
So how to bring all of thistogether into one place with a
vision to improve our healththrough home cooking over time,
with Finst.
Steven (01:51):
You know, cooking, just like you said, has a lot to do
with inspiration.
But getting this app launched,getting it started, what
inspired you to do that?
What was that point in yourhead that just gave you that aha
moment and made you want to gotoward something like this?
Asaf (02:07):
First, I'm a foodie guy.
Ok, I like to cook.
I used to be in kitchens and ateenager and later on.
But what made the differencewas COVID, and during COVID I
was three kids and we were inNew York during this time with
(02:27):
three young kids at home allover and cooking started to be a
necessity because they couldn'tstand watching my kids eating
those.
I say, yeah, double-crossedchicken fingers.
So I put like a two-hour slotsin the car in there and the rest
is a story.
What cooking did to my family,not only from nutrition
(02:51):
perspective, but also get toknow your kid and something for
their future.
Many things to say about it.
But this was, this is themoment that everything started.
Steven (03:03):
Yeah, Was there ever a moment, on the other hand, too,
where you're looking throughrecipes you're looking online
different things, maybe someblogs, just recipes in general
Was there that moment where youthought to yourself there has to
be an easier way or on a moreefficient way to do this?
Asaf (03:21):
I'm dealing with AI, vision, computer vision, process
control and consumer from verydifferent angles.
Along the year and in 2020, Istarted to dive into the
articles that talk aboutmultimodal with AI and it was
mind-blowing.
(03:41):
We went through the deeplearning revolution and Gen AI
is kind of the next phase ofthis one.
But the ability to take contentlike liquid images and text and
video and fuse them in a waythat creates reasoning and be
able for a machine to digestthis data it changed the whole
(04:08):
paradigm of how people cook,because I can provide you the
information exactly how you wantit.
If you want it to look likeshorts on YouTube, then this is
how it looks.
Like the technology wasn'tthere yet in terms of production
, but it was clear that we cando much more than having with
(04:30):
our phone in the kitchen cooking.
Steven (04:33):
So talking about all of that and we'll take a glimpse
behind the curtain a littlelater but if you're a user on
the Vinst app, you open it, youcreate an account.
But if you're a user on theVinst app, you open it, you
create an account.
What can people do?
Kind of a step-by-step of allof the capabilities.
I mean there's links you canput onto the app that'll give
you a recipe.
(04:53):
There's videos, like you said,even pictures Give us kind of
like a step-by-step what a usercan expect when opening the
Vinst app when opening the Vinstapp.
Asaf (05:03):
When you open the Vinst app, you get first a list of all
your recipes that are in thesame format, saved in one
location.
Like technology today, even ifit takes 10 years ago, changed
dramatically the way that wecook.
We enter the kitchen with ourphone, we cook our browser timer
, calculator, chat notes.
(05:25):
We have our cameras, we wedon't need to be next to our
parents for 20 years and learnhow to cook.
We just open instagram andtiktok and everything goes uh to
you in a one-to-many approach,and it changed dramatically the
way that people learn and cook.
But if you look at theexperience of how it feels to
(05:46):
cook with everything around, itis at least joint experience.
It's all over, the screenturned off and the images are
lost in the camera rolls andthere is recipes on Instagram
and recipes in WhatsApp threadswith friends and not everything
and pop-up from advertisementand it's like Windows 95, like
(06:08):
the promise is there.
The promise is there, thetechnology is working, but there
is some missing brand andalignment on voice and tone and
some guidance of puttingeverything together without the
need to go to the timer or toGoogle or to translate or to
look at weird recipes, or scrollall the way down and to see
(06:31):
where the hell are theinstructions, or just being able
to keep in one place everythingand never go and search your
recipes in other places, and, ontop of it, being able to
collaborate and create sharedcollections with your family and
with cooking clubs and friendsand community.
(06:53):
And everything that I saiduntil now is free.
So our basic assumption is that,in order to make such an
improvement in the way thatpeople cook, there are various
studies that show that homecooking translates to better
nutrition practices.
It is the journey, the factthat you control the ingredients
(07:15):
and be aware of what you put inyour mouth.
It's like putting yourself on ascale every morning.
Eventually, you will loseweight.
So if we will make home cookingeasier and allow everyone to do
those, things will be alsobetter uh nutrition for all.
Uh.
So if you want to create suchan impact and being able to
(07:37):
share between everyone, it mustbe free.
So the thing that related tothis uh is uh, that on this part
, we're pretty unique.
Steven (07:47):
Yeah, it definitely makes you unique because
everything is down to a paywallthese days.
So, having you know, Idownloaded the app myself.
I was looking around to it andjust the capabilities that you
have in the app to make cookingeasier, to make it a little more
accessible and it being free,is really unique to the app.
(08:09):
So I completely agree with youon that front.
And to do all of that, youreally leverage into AI,
artificial intelligence.
So how do you use AI to makeall of these processes easier
for a user?
Asaf (08:23):
AI is like electricity.
It's not a product.
You know GPT, can you knowelectricity like you go straight
to GPT.
There is a lot of value aroundcopy, but you can feed a lot of
products and create amazingthings.
So how AI is plugged intoVINCED in a way that help us
(08:43):
cook is in every detail aroundthe app.
We use electricity and we useAI.
First, when you bring yourrecipes from Instagram text or
images or URLs online, weextract the data with AI and
provide you all the recipesorganized and categorized,
(09:06):
auto-categorized so if you wantto find recipes by meal type or
ingredients or dessert or typeof cuisine and we have lots of
type of categorization you caneasily go and find them and
search them in a really easy way, in a really easy way.
Not to mention that when youcook those recipes, that the
(09:26):
view is very structured and youcan see all the recipes in the
same way.
The screen is always on.
We have, of course, our GPT andyou can ask questions, but also
the timers are ready for you inadvance, so you don't need to
go anywhere outside the app todo things whether to write notes
and if you take pictures, weactually add them to the app to
do things, whether to writenotes, and if you take pictures,
(09:46):
we actually add them to the appitself.
We also allow you to puttogether playlists of recipes in
a collection.
It's really nice curatedcollections that you have on
your collections tab and thosecollections can also be shared
with others and create acollaborative collections with
friends or with families, whichis very unique in the way that
(10:10):
you can actually share and dothings together and just make
your cooking experience mucheasier.
The optional side, which iswhat we are selling, is we can
turn those collections intoself-published cookbooks that
you can use for gifting aspecial gift for Thanksgiving or
(10:35):
a special event like graduation.
We had now a scout that everychild gave one recipe and they
bought 20 kind of books forgraduations that all the
families received or justpreserving family recipes,
(10:55):
thinking about your mom, dad,their recipes, their friends and
putting it together, and itcould be a really nice project
to cherish those traditions andbring back those recipes to the
table and helping us cook easily, collaboratively and easily,
(11:15):
eventually, with VINCED.
Steven (11:17):
And that's one of another unique thing about the
app.
It's, of course, on it at the,at face value.
It's about cooking, it's makingaccessing recipes easier, but
it really is about connectingpeople, right.
Whether it's through thecreation of your own cookbook,
sharing recipes with otherfriends, family members, is that
(11:41):
something that was important toyou?
Obviously, you told the storyabout COVID and cooking for your
children and all that Isconnecting family and friends.
One of the more importantthings about the Vinst app as
well.
Asaf (11:51):
Definitely.
I can give you an example.
I think that today we can talkabout it.
We really look at from if yougo 30,000 feet up, okay, we look
at the food system.
We look at the food systemthough.
We spend a significant amountof time to look at it not only
from recipe perspective, butalso from industry, culinary
(12:16):
food science, going to evenprocessed food, looking into the
academia and how they look atit.
I myself spent like one year ina cooking school and working in
a fine dining restaurant as acook just to feel how a kitchen,
professional, kitchen work.
But a lot of those are wherethe thought leaders are defining
(12:39):
culinary right.
When you look at the food systemas a whole from many different
perspectives, you understandthat what you want to do for our
food system to be better areactually the reason why we cook
at home.
We want to make our food systemmore connecting more.
It's a way to express love youcook the food you love very
(13:01):
emotional, and it's a way toexpress love you cook the food
you love very emotional, andit's a way to to bring people
together.
And we wanted to be healthierour food system.
We wanted to use less resourcesand we want us to be friendly
to the environment.
These are why people cook.
You cook the food you love forthe people you love, you, you
cook.
(13:21):
I discovered last year that twoof my kids have celiac, so
health turned a very drasticshift for me.
But health and wellness is oneof the reasons we cook at cost
and the environment, and thoseare the reasons.
So let's cook.
If you want to make our foodsystem better, then let's cook.
And the first thing that Italked about was about
(13:43):
connection, about those people,and we call what we do in the
kitchen.
We call it a food story, in thesense that you know, you bring
your inspiration, your smells,the bloggers, mom, whatever to
the table and to the kitchen andyou cook as you do it with your
(14:04):
oven and your things and yourtaste and your spicy and your
hands, and eventually somethingdifferent is made that is yours.
This is your food story.
So how can you create such atool without sharing and
collaborating?
Because this is how we learnhow to cook.
(14:28):
If you look at where it startedand where it goes, it's all
summed into making cookingeasier, but also education, for
(14:54):
instance, farm-to-table.
Farm-to-table is one of thebasic things to learn when you
cook at home, because if I willtell you to cook healthy which
is logic, probably it won't lastbeyond a few weeks.
But if I will give you ways tomake your food tastier or make
it cheaper and make it morefresh and healthy, then you will
do it.
And how we can tie?
Or how can you usecollaboration and sharing to
(15:14):
teach people about farm-to-table, about local ingredients, about
even support your local farms?
Just share with them recipesthat are relevant for the season
.
We are now starting to.
We're in collaboration with Ican say it now with West
Virginia University.
(15:35):
It's still not in place, so wegot here kind of news and we
created for them a collection, ashareable cookbook, that
shareable collection of recipesthat feature fruits, that and
vegetables that now grow inVirginia during the summer.
(15:55):
And those are only simplerecipes, easy to cook, less than
30 minutes.
Just try to replace thoseshakes and things that they buy
and say you know, we have greatfruits, it will be tasty, it's
less than half a dollar perperson.
And try, through behavioralscience, to bring those people
(16:18):
to cook more and to acquirebetter nutrition habits over
time.
You cannot do it withoutcollaborating.
Steven (16:28):
Yeah, no, that makes sense.
How does that translate to thehome?
Maybe someone doesn't haveaccess to a quote farm to table
kind of situation.
Uh, they're in the city.
How does it translate?
Can you ask the app or thechatbot to find a replacement?
What can I do?
I'm not near a farm, I'm notnear, uh, fresh produce.
(16:50):
Essentially, how can I replacethat?
What can I do to make my recipea little more nutritional, a
little bit more better for me?
Asaf (16:58):
it is a really good question.
I think that I was alwayssurprised how the number one
go-to for cooking is New YorkTimes.
They really have the bestrecipes.
But no matter where you are inthe world, you are cooking the
same recipe.
But you know there are seasonsand I you know personally myself
(17:22):
, I need a gluten-free nutritionand I want low fat or I want
something quick and easy.
With AI, you can make thosechanges.
So, no matter where you're inthe world, with VINCED we can
adjust recipes to your taste andalso to your local environment
(17:47):
and your local ingredients thatyou had before.
Like, we're looking intoprecision nutrition.
When you look at Vinst, youknow now we just launched that
this year.
We just started and the app isgrowing in a really high pace.
But if you look at where we'regoing, we want to also get
(18:07):
feedback from your Apple Watch,your blood test, your sleep, and
every week we'll give you somebiofeedback of how the food that
you ate affected your health.
And with precision nutritionand AI, we can actually modify
those things to adjust to yourtaste, to your diet restrictions
(18:32):
, to your busy schedule, to yourwhatever budget that you have.
So if you are in New York,instead of having long hauls of
potato breads and chickennuggets from America.
You're next to the sea.
You're next to the sea Eat fish.
This is my message.
You know, I was in Japan thisspring with my family and I had
(18:59):
a nice, kind of nice place thatI rented, with a kitchen because
I felt that I need to cook inthe morning, and I was surprised
that everything is fresh.
Like everywhere that you go,everything is so fresh and so
clean.
And you go to the supermarket,there are no carts, there are
only small baskets, and you seethat people in Japan all the
(19:23):
industries farm to table Likethey don't consume almost.
They don't have frozen meals,they don't have this.
You won't see this in thesupermarket and every time they
eat or buy the things that arefresh and local, go back home
and then the price is also lower.
We just need to understand whatour land around us gives us,
(19:46):
and this is an example of thedirections that we're going.
Steven (19:50):
Yeah, and you brought up a good point with the frozen
meals.
Let's say someone who can'tcook, they rely on those frozen
meals.
Let's say they have XYZ frozenmeal.
Can they go into your app andsay hey to the chatbot, give me
a maybe identical, a similarrecipe to this frozen meal.
(20:12):
Will the app give maybe a morenutritional option for it?
A recipe, a simple recipe for,let's say, a frozen meal.
Asaf (20:21):
We're going in this direction.
We have some certain tweaks andwe have a recipe tweaker I can
share with you.
It's something that we'reworking now with the academia to
understand what type ofprecision nutrition would be.
We're also looking intoresearch.
I don't know how much you knowabout Nenit, my previous company
(20:42):
that I founded, but Nenit is aconsumer product that helps
parents put their baby to sleep.
It's a baby monitor that yousell on the market and everyone
knows that I'm talking aboutparents.
But on the back end, our firstinvestor were Cornell and
Technion University.
Our first investors wereCornell and Technion University
(21:10):
and we created a platform forresearchers to expand our
knowledge on baby sleep anddevelopment.
From early detection of autismwith UCLA and Autism Speak to
dozens of journal papers, peerreview, we became the gold
standard of how to measure sleepoutside of the lab.
Then it went through avalidation studies for the sleep
scoring technology.
When you are thinking about itas a whole, you know we move now
from sleep to nutrition.
We can go into groups and likediabetics and think about okay,
(21:36):
how to support diabetics andallow them to do all the
low-glochemium turn every recipeto low-glochemium version using
VINs.
It is a huge lots of population, like lots of types of
different of that you need tounderstand.
We cannot boil the ocean interms of the opportunity that
(21:58):
exists out there, but I thinkthat AI created a product for
100 years, like electricity, soat some point we'll reach there.
Steven (22:11):
So that brings up a great point talking about Nana
and we're jumping around alittle bit here.
But how did Nana and foundingthat inspire or help you create
VINCED and the earliest stagesof VINCED?
Take us through that timelineof NANA and then going into
VINCED?
Asaf (22:28):
For me there's a really smooth transition between
everything.
I started in semiconductors I'mtalking about 2004, ddi and we
(22:49):
tried with a neural network,classified defects on silicon
wafer as part of theclassification process and it
was process control and I loveprocesses, I like to measure
everything and I moved fromthere to like I did my thesis
around it and I was working on aproduct that I was on the
(23:10):
algorithm side.
I was only kind of and I wastrying to do process control for
flowers and for textile and forPCB and for vegetables, and
then I moved to my PhD andstarted to do process control
for babies.
A crib is like a chamber.
It turned into a consumerproduct.
But if you look at the initialhow Nanny started, it called and
(23:30):
told Nanny how to identifydiseases and disorders earlier
with a camera.
It wasn't even about a screen.
I moved as a postdoc to CornellUniversity with this concept to
commercialize it maybe, but Ithink that we improve Dr Cornell
University with this concept.
To commercialize it maybe, butI think that we improve or we do
sleep training and help parentsput their baby to sleep and
(23:50):
through the data that weaggregate, we tell something
about sleep and developments forkids and also for parents here
with VINCED.
It's the same vision.
Through home cooking from aweekly basis, we do some
behavioral change as well, withthose feedback that we'll
provide you on a weekly basis,with this kind of biofeedback,
(24:15):
with how we educate you aboutfarm-to-table through emotions
and incentive.
We did all those things withNenit and with Nenit we also
work closely with Academia.
Academia is, I think, thepartnership between industry and
Academia can bring to greatbusinesses and amazing social
(24:38):
impact, and this is a joint rolethat academia and industry have
and I can talk a lot only aboutthis because I was only on the
same.
But we use the academia tounderstand what is belief and
what is science.
Like, parents have a lot ofways to put their baby to sleep,
lots of beliefs and everythingis good.
(24:58):
You know we cannot, cannot.
You know if you feel something,always leave right with your
hearts, but as a company, as abrand, you need to be
responsible.
So we uh, the president of thetechnion was of the founders of
sleep medicine and we connectedwith the top leaders on baby
sleep and development and one ofthem was professor.
Obviously I won't go into allthe details, but I need to say
(25:21):
this name.
So what should we do now to putbaby to sleep?
Studies show that.
We're looking for evidence.
There is an evidence that homecooking improves your health.
There is evidence about whathappens when you consume food
from local environment.
(25:41):
If you consume home cookinguntil age of five, there are a
lot of studies that show thatless chances that you'll develop
celiac, for instance and we canuse the research in VINCED our
connection to them in a way thatwill help us to make an impact,
significant impact, on ournutrition eventually.
Steven (26:07):
Right and going from Nanit into Vince.
Both are using technology andscience and blending that with
people's very personal livesmaybe some very personal moments
, Maybe some very personalmoments.
And let's go to Vince.
You're accessing some photosfrom recipes or food and cooking
with people's very personallives.
(26:28):
How do you balance thatinnovation and setting yourself
up in these people's personallives?
How do you balance thatinnovation and people's very
personal moments?
Asaf (26:40):
Yeah, I don't see any problem around it.
Steven (26:43):
Actually.
Asaf (26:43):
I'm always amazed how consumers are not logical in the
way that they work.
It's not like I save money, soI do this.
B2b is much more easier tounderstand before even you went
to scale With people.
The challenge is understandinghow the data, how the statistic
(27:08):
overall it's a problem that youmust look at numbers, you must
look at feedback.
You cannot say what is, andthose things personal things and
fact that you see that are likea hum moment, shape your
product and it's probably theonly way to shape your product
(27:30):
Smart people that sit in a roomand think about the product
eventually, if they won't use it.
Listen to the users, have themhear what they want.
It's not that they need to makethe decision.
You have the strategy andunderstand.
But going into those personaldetails, this is the way to
create value every time Right,and how do you take user
(27:52):
feedback?
Steven (27:53):
Do you take that heavily into consideration and what has
that feedback been from usersusing the Vinst app?
Asaf (28:01):
As an analog, it's like going to a kindergarten and
trying to develop first grade.
So they don't know to read yet,right, but you're just trying
to understand how to bring themto first grade.
You need to work with them.
They don't make changes intheir life until there is a
(28:22):
really good reason.
If you will download the appand you won't be able to log in,
you will throw it and you won'tcontinue.
If I will ping you to downloadthe app, you will ask me how do
I fix it right?
So the user journey needs to besmooth and there is a lot of
details when you look at thisfunnel of bringing people to
(28:44):
become users, and the way to doit is just observing.
The first thing that we did wasto go to people's home and see
how they cook.
We did many, many surveysaround the US to understand how
kitchens look like, how peoplecook, how frequently they cook,
(29:04):
how do they do it, what are theyand, based on the data they
aggregate you cannot, by the way, measure everything but your
service or anything.
Well, do you have some uhinstincts around something?
It's not, and eventually theydon't know what the book is and
I know where I'm taking them.
So, uh, it's not that it'severything what the user are
(29:27):
doing, but you're using datafrom them to make informed
decisions on your productroadmap and what were some of
those when you're firstlaunching Vinst?
Steven (29:36):
what were some of those hurdles or maybe some challenges
that you had to overcome, andhow did you overcome them?
Asaf (29:43):
to overcome and how did you overcome them?
I think that the biggestchallenge was understanding how
to deal with uncertainty aroundAI, because from the early
beginning, we said you know youcan talk to your phone and ask
them how to solve this problemwith a dishwasher and should
have a video of you know theBosch CEO telling you how to fix
(30:07):
that dishwasher.
You know this is where theworld is going right, but
creating such a solution fromintegration, from production
perspective, take time a year,two years.
So we want to move really,really fast, but we need to
create a technology strategyroadmap that would say where to
(30:31):
put things along the way.
And it's not only by the waywhen the technology arrives,
it's also a moment in time.
For instance, we saw that whenpeople create a book for their
family, for instance, thebiggest challenges for them is
to bring images.
You know it's there.
My mom took this Like I don'thave it now and or like it's a
(30:56):
hustle, like you cook.
Sometimes you forget to takepictures because you're so
hungry and you want to dosomething and you just don't
think about it.
So why don't we do an imagewith AI?
And we found out that it reallyworked.
But there was a question whetherthe sentiment around it will be
positive or negative, and whatwe found?
(31:19):
That in some sense, when wetalk about AI, we pass the
Rubicon.
Everyone wants to be part of it.
There was a point in time thateveryone left their Nokia phone
and moved to iPhone, crossingthe chasm you know the layers of
the world.
We realized that we are thereand we're fine with generating
(31:42):
AI images, because you want tosee the real recipe.
You don't want to see an AIgenerated images, but making all
in all, it's better thannothing and it looks also really
good when you print it.
I recommend all of you to seehow good it is.
Steven (32:02):
What does the team behind vince uh product look
like?
Is there uh developers?
Is there cooks all going intothe the same product?
Asaf (32:12):
first I have my co-founder and fisher, and he used to be
my vp, svp of rnd at nenit.
At nenit we'll build a computervision on the cloud with real
time on firmware, hardwaremanufacturing, manufacturing,
mobile.
He orchestrated all thisoperation and he's also a pastry
chef.
So after working a decadetogether, we moved to this
(32:37):
journey.
So first I have my co-founder,and this is the beginning.
My first hire was designresearch, also with Nanit in New
York.
By the beginning, my first hirewas design research, also with
NENET in New York.
By the way, understanding andobservation and conduct
qualitative and quantitativestudies, being able to interview
, being able to look into dataand drive conclusions.
(33:00):
I don't believe in luck.
I believe that first youmeasure and then you make
decisions.
So first measure what is notknown and then you'll be able to
move forward.
So design is a big part.
But then you have developers,you have culinary experts.
We are all kind of foodies.
If you will download the app,on the collections tab you will
(33:24):
see a collection that was madeby the Vince team.
So if you want to know thembetter, you got the recipes from
their home so you can go thereand each one have my grandma
pickles, which are the bestpickles ever, and what is nice
about pickles?
That you need only pickles andsalt.
(33:44):
That is not only cheap butavailable everywhere and you can
have your really fresh, nicepickles for yourself but many
other great recipes that you canenjoy.
If you want to know the teambetter.
Steven (33:59):
No, that's great.
I saw the pickles.
When I first downloaded the app, I saw the other recipes that
are already available to a user,which I find very interesting
because it does ease a user in.
When you open the app, it's nota blank page.
You already have a dozen or sorecipes right at your fingertips
(34:20):
.
Is that something that you tookinto consideration when
developing?
Asaf (34:23):
Yes, we started with the pain points.
The pain points were theorganization.
I think that there are a lot ofsites and whatever that feels
like an e-commerce for recipesthat you get lost.
Vince's app is very minimalistin the design.
We can bring you a lot ofrecipes.
We can generate recipes, we canbut the first pain point is
(34:46):
bring yours.
You find something on Instagram, just throw it to Vince.
Just click the share, throw itto Vince and you don't need to
think about it.
It's already there.
We will process, we willextract, we'll make it available
in the best way for you to cookit once you want it.
Steven (35:03):
And looking towards the future.
Where do you see Vinst goingand what's your ultimate goal?
Moving forward.
Asaf (35:10):
We want to make our food system better and we want to
make it through home cooking.
I think that we entered thisbig party of probably the
largest market in the world 10%of global economy and we try to
be partners for the people athome that cook in helping them
to go through it in the easiestway.
(35:32):
Education is a big part of itand I think that education with
generative AI what I told youbefore you can ask Julia Child
to make you a French onion soup,and she will be there with you
and instruct you before.
You can ask Julia Child to makeyou a French onion soup, and
she will be there with you andinstruct you with what you are
doing and show you how to cutthe onion that you actually have
in your hand.
(35:53):
That technology is not there interms of production, but it
will be there.
It's just a matter of time.
So we design for this futureand think about like a Spotify
for recipes in some way.
Steven (36:08):
I love that comparison Sharing with friends, creating a
playlist playlist in quotes ofrecipes, which is really great.
So it's definitely wait and seewhat technology looks like, and
Vince will be right there,adapting and expanding with it.
Asaf (36:23):
Yes, there, adapting and expanding with it.
Yes, and the research part, ofcourse, working with the data
and measure what the food thatwe eat, how it affects our
community, how it affects ourhealth, how it affects our
resources.
We can correlate it's kind ofan FDA process even of things
(36:44):
that and you look at it a largeway, but there is still a long
way to be there.
Steven (36:52):
Absolutely, and we're looking forward to following
that journey as you move forwardinto the future.
Now, as we wrap things up, isthere anything else that you
wanted to add, anything that wemight've missed, that you'd want
a potential user to know?
Whether it's an amateur chef ora professional chef, anyone can
use the vinst app and maybe Ican send you the recipe tweaker.
Asaf (37:14):
Yeah, uh, you don't need to download the vinst app to use
it.
It's a website but you can useit to take whatever recipe you
have, whether it's from mom orfrom blogger or whatever.
Put the URL to paste it insideand tweak it in a way that you
want to be with less sugar, lesseasy to make.
(37:35):
As an example of the thingsthat you can do with AI and
really easily get the recipe asyou want to cook with Could be
helpful for many of the audiencewho cook at home.
Steven (37:49):
Well, asaf, I appreciate that.
We'll definitely try to getthat out there and, once again,
I just can't thank you enoughfor jumping on, taking the time
out of your day and joining us.
This was a lot of fun.
Asaf (37:59):
Thank you.
Thank you for the time.
It was a pleasure.
Steven (38:01):
Absolutely.
That's all the time we havetoday.
We look forward to anotherepisode.
We'll see you next time.
Thanks for listening to thisepisode of the Four Worlds
Podcast.
Until next time, you can catchup on the latest innovations
shaping our world atTomorrowsWorldTodaycom.
Follow us on Facebook andInstagram, and be sure to
(38:23):
subscribe to our YouTube channel.
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