A startup launched in Vancouver this month to boost the restaurant industry with artificial intelligence technology.
Following a beta run in B.C., Umamii currently operates locally and in the Greater Toronto Area.
The food discovery community and restaurant curation platform is built for people
who love dining out, according to a statement from the upstart.
Umamii’s platform aims to help users find restaurants they’ll actually love based on personal preferences and credible sources, says chief executive officer Craig Ryomoto.
“Restaurant discovery hasn’t evolved in years,” the cofounder laments.
Restaurant goers today “are overwhelmed by conflicting reviews and influencer noise,” Ryomoto posits.
The problem “isn’t a lack of information,” he says. “It’s that there’s too much of it.”
Between Instagram and TikTok content, restaurant awards, paid influencers, and questionable reviews, Ryomoto suggests that “it’s hard to know who to trust.”
In response, “we built Umamii to make dining decisions faster, more personal, and more trustworthy by combining real community voices with intelligent curation.”
It’s “about making decisions quickly and confidently so you can enjoy meals that truly feel worthy of your time and money,” he says.
Ryomoto, who says he grew up in a family “rooted in the restaurant industry,” reflects on his initial inspiration for the company: dining out while travelling the world.
The entrepreneur—who has worked at Hootsuite, Bench, and Thinkific—found restaurant information everywhere to be “fragmented and unreliable.”
So Ryomoto partnered with Helen Park and Arnold Ryomoto to build the platform, which now features more than 5,000 restaurants and counting.
“For the past several months our small team has been heads down building, testing, and rethinking what dining discovery should look like,” he recently posted on LinkedIn.
Features of the Umamii mobile app include the ability to customize which people and sources influence recommendations; to explore curated lists and receive personalized restaurant suggestions; read real reviews; follow chefs and other restaurant insiders; and plan meals with others in the community.
“Our mission is to reinvent how people dine out and how restaurants build sustainable
revenue,” says Ryomoto, whose passions intersect at food, travel, and technology scaling.
On the tech front, more is to come, according to Ryomoto: “We’re developing intelligent marketing and audience-engagement tools that help restaurants connect directly with diners and optimize operations.”
Umamii has garnered pre-seed funding with plans to raise seed capital in 2026.
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