Proxy Foods AI raises US$6 million seed round to expand AI platform for food and beverage R&D

Proxy Foods AI has raised a US$6 million seed funding round to expand its AI-native research and development platform for the food and beverage industry, with the company planning to strengthen its food science, regulatory and commercialization capabilities while growing its global enterprise customer base.

• Proxy Foods AI raised a US$6 million seed round led by Ted Leonsis, with participation from Robert G. Hisaoka and SWaN & Legend Venture Partners.
• The company planned to expand its AI platform, strengthen enterprise capabilities and grow its global customer base across food, beverage and ingredient companies.
• Proxy Foods AI also disclosed research collaborations spanning cultivated meat media development, food formulation science and data security.

The Washington, DC-headquartered company announced that the round was led by Ted Leonsis, Founder, Chairman, Managing Partner and CEO of Monumental Sports & Entertainment, with lead participation from Robert G. Hisaoka and SWaN & Legend Venture Partners.

The investment will be used to expand the company's enterprise platform, accelerate development of AI agents designed to support food and beverage innovation, and broaden adoption among consumer packaged goods manufacturers, foodservice operators and ingredient suppliers.

Proxy Foods AI said its platform was designed to help companies integrate institutional R&D knowledge, predict formulation performance before laboratory testing and accelerate the development of new products and reformulations.

According to the company, customers using the platform have reduced new product development iterations by 80%, achieved 2-10% reductions in cost of goods for reformulation projects, shortened prototype development timelines from months to days and generated full platform return on investment from a single successful product launch.

Its customer base includes companies such as Barilla, MISTA, restaurant chain CAVA and Gefsinus. Proxy Foods AI said the average enterprise customer generated more than US$1 billion in annual revenue.

"Leading food and beverage companies leverage our platform to create a new R&D environment, where teams are empowered by technology to fully use their creative capacity, quickly reimagine legacy products, open up new categories, and deliver better taste, nutrition, and affordability," said Panos Kostopoulos, CEO of Proxy Foods AI.

"AI helps solve the inefficiencies and imbalances of large food manufacturing systems, and the result is better food at scale, for everyone."

Beyond commercial deployment, the company has also expanded its academic research activities.

Proxy Foods AI confirmed it has collaborated with Stanford University and Food System Innovations to develop product optimization models using Expert Guided Bayesian Optimization (EGBO), which it said achieved near-perfect sensory matching while outperforming conventional product development approaches.

The company is also participating in a Good Food Institute-funded research project with the Federal University of Paraná and McGill University focused on applying AI to the development of cell culture media for cultivated meat production.

On the infrastructure side, Proxy Foods AI recently partnered with cybersecurity company Aperio Global to add what it described as a Zero Trust, quantum-resilient security layer capable of performing computation on encrypted formulation data without exposing proprietary information.

The company said the additional security capabilities were intended to support organizations handling sensitive R&D, sourcing, manufacturing and regulatory data.

Leonsis said the company had the potential to transform innovation across the food sector.

"When I first met Panos, it was clear he was building a platform that could revolutionize our global food system, and I was eager to support his vision," he said.

"Proxy Foods AI is applying innovative technology to one of the world's largest and most essential industries in a way that is practical, measurable and built for scale. This funding will help expand the capabilities of Proxy Foods AI's platform and bring its technology to more food and beverage companies around the world, fundamentally reshaping and accelerating innovation across the global food system."

Proxy Foods AI said it expected AI to play an increasingly important role in managing the growing complexity of food product development, particularly where manufacturers must simultaneously balance nutrition, cost, clean-label requirements, allergens, shelf life, regional sourcing and differing regulatory requirements.

Maria Velissariou, a member of the company's advisory board and former Chief Science Officer at Mars, said predictive AI would reshape food innovation.

"I believe the future of food R&D lies in AI-enabled product design, shifting innovation from trial-and-error to predictive science. Proxy Foods is redefining how food companies enhance today's portfolios while designing the next generation of products, making innovation faster, smarter, and more future-ready."

The funding round also included participation from investors including Ike Grigoropoulos, Ted Xenohristos, Dimitri Moshovitis, Howard Eisenberg, Jeff Skoll, Roger W. Ferguson Jr., Michelle Freeman, Yiannis Gavrielides, Evee and Alexander Georgiadis, Chris Goulakos, George P. Stamas and Grant Verstandig.

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