Now, in an era of rapidly advancing artificial intelligence, Clark and his team are developing NutriSelect, a tool that harnesses algorithms and machine learning to verify the science, or lack thereof, behind the supplements consumers want to purchase.
“Maybe 60% to 80% of supplements don’t have scientific validation or really solid validation,” Dr. Clark, PhD, a 30-year veteran of the supplement industry, told NutraIngredients. “We’re going to know that number by the time we finish this exercise, because we’re going to have real data.”
He added that the exercise will allow NutriSelect to scour publicly available scientific studies in real time to determine the efficacy of a supplement and its ingredients and then assign a numerical score to the supplement based on study data. The higher the ranking, the more substantiated the supplement is.
The ranking will consider a supplement’s quality and source of evidence, label transparency and ingredient accuracy, clinical dosage standards, reproducibility of results and regulatory certifications, among other factors.
The company is currently deciding how it will rank commodities or single entity products such as vitamin C, for example, where there already is a plethora of research.
“We don’t do a good job of servicing the consumer in my opinion,” Dr. Clark said. “At the end of the day, consumers are still sitting at their computers Google searching, trying to locate a product for their condition that they ultimately can’t find.”
NutriSelect will not be able to identify all 100,000 supplements on the market, at least not initially. However, as the company perfects its proprietary algorithm, more supplements will be ranked.
The NutriSelect protype was launched in October, and a beta version will soon be available to trial with more than 30,000 users the company has gathered through social networks. The company is planning an official launch by the end of this year, including integrating the platform through wearables, Dr. Clark said.
Seed funding
NutriSelect is raising $500,000 in pre-seed capital and estimates that it will need $2 to $5 million at the seed-funding level. Dr. Clark says European investors have expressed interest but that the company is first focused on the U.S. market.
Investment in AI tools is at a high. Putting aside large language model OpenAI, there has been $40 billion in Q1 2025 investment by venture capital into artificial intelligence applications, according to Dr. Clark.
He said he also hopes to expand revenue by partnering with companies that create nutrition, wellness and fitness apps that may incorporate NutriSelect into their platforms. The company has further plans to approach the U.S. Food and Drug Administration and the Federal Trade Commission about the possible use of its product, having a version of NutriSelect available for those agencies.
NutriSelect may offer B2B consulting for businesses that seek to improve their NutriSelect ranking, though Dr. Clark noted that this does not mean a pay-to-play arrangement for companies.
Ultimately the service is filling a need for consumers, Dr. Clark said, as most of them are overwhelmed when attempting to take control of their health, not knowing who to trust.
“With a low barrier to entry in the U.S. market, the supplement industry became a playground for opportunists and hype,” he wrote in a LinkedIn post. “Influencers replaced experts. Buzzwords replaced evidence. And consumers were left sorting through conflicting advice and flashy labels with no way to tell what actually works. Even with my insider knowledge, I’ve had to dig deep to verify claims.”
He added: “If it’s hard for me, how does the average person stand a chance?”
