AI powered culinary coach wins Ascensia Diabetes Challenge

 Whisk’s winning innovation is a Culinary Coach that uses Artificial Intelligence (AI) to provide personalised food recommendations based on flavour preferences and food avoidance, which will be expanded to use blood glucose data for people with diabetes. Whisk presented their winning solution to the diabetes community for the first time at the 2018 DiabetesMine D-Data Exchange Event in Orlando. 

The Whisk platform is an AI-powered nutrition platform that currently enables users to browse recipes based on factors including their personal taste preferences, time constraints, budgets, weather and dietary restrictions or allergies. Once a user adds a recipe to their meal plan, it can be automatically added to an online shopping cart at some grocery retailers, allowing them to buy ingredients. 

Whisk plan to create a personalised food experience for people with type two diabetes that will learn from their blood glucose readings and make food recommendations that are more tailored to their own diabetes. Using readings from Ascensia’s blood glucose monitoring systems, the AI will learn how the user’s blood glucose readings react to specific foods and recipes, allowing them to build a tailored meal plan for their diabetes that can help to keep their blood glucose in range. 

Michael Kloss, CEO and President of Ascensia Diabetes Care, said: “Nutrition and food selection is a huge component of type two diabetes management. The panel of judges and I were hugely impressed by Whisk’s current tool and how they plan to develop it for people with type two diabetes. By helping people with type two diabetes find personalised and tailored meal recommendations that are based on their own blood glucose data and food preferences, we have the potential to empower millions of people with type two diabetes to make healthier food choices that they will enjoy.” 

Whisk’s solution was selected from 116 entries that were submitted to the challenge from 25 countries and they will receive a cash reward of €100,000 to build and pilot this exciting new service for people with type two diabetes, working closely with Ascensia Diabetes Care to bring it to patients. 

Whisk’s core technology uses food ontology known as the Food Genome, which incorporates and understands macro and micro-nutritional data, flavor compounds, store availability, price and promotions. Whisk is currently available in the US, UK and Australia, powering half a million shopping lists every month at grocery retailers including Walmart, Tesco and Amazon Fresh. 

Nick Holzherr, Whisk Founder and CEO, said: “We are absolutely delighted to have been chosen as the winner of the Ascensia Diabetes Challenge. Type two diabetes has reached epidemic levels in recent years, and at Whisk we are excited to be building a solution that we feel can help support these patients to make lasting lifestyle changes. We hope that through our work with Ascensia Diabetes Care, we can help to change the way this condition is managed.” 

The competition also selected two runners-up. US-based Qstream were named as runner-up for their mobile learning platform that combines a concept known as spaced education with engaging game mechanics. This platform is designed to encourage meaningful behaviour change and has been proven in a recent randomised trial to generate sustained and meaningful reductions in HbA1c in people with diabetes.

xBird, a Germany-based medical artificial intelligence software company was also named as a runner-up. Their software analyses micro-movements, collected by smartphones and wearables, and cross references them with historical blood glucose data, with the aim of being able to predict and detect potential hypo- and hyperglycemic events. Both runners-up will receive a cash reward of €30,000 to further develop their solutions.

Walk With Path were also recognised for their highly innovative active insole for people with peripheral neuropathy due to diabetes. Their insole provides vibrational feedback during walking that can be tracked via an app and is designed to help people achieve better balance, thereby reducing the risk of falls. Ascensia will support Walk with Path to conduct a proof of concept study in patients with diabetes.