Team

Todd Knobel is the business expert at the helm of Foogal. Before setting out in the world of nutrition, Todd held a partnership position at the international consulting firm Arthur Andersen and was the CEO of KeyWorld Investments. His experience in these fields was put into practice with the founding of The Windsor Knot, a chain of 45 menswear store throughout Russia. His academic background includes a Bachelor’s Degree in Economics from the University of Nebraska, where he was a Truman Scholar. He also holds a Juris Doctorate Degree from Georgetown and a Master in Finance from the London Business School.

John Motley is our Chief Retail Relations Officer and before he took up that role, he was the Senior Vice President of Government and Public Affairs at the Food Marketing Institute, an international food trade association. He also held similar positions at the National Retail Federation and the NFIB, and is a forty-year veteran of the government affairs arena in Washington, representing both large and small businesses before Congress and the Executive Branch. John’s work has been featured in The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post, The New York Times and other national newspapers and business magazines and he has also appeared on Good Morning America, the Today Show, the MacNeil-Lehrer News Hour, and on CNN’s Money Line, Politics Today, Crossfire and Late Edition programs.

Patty James passion, energy and enthusiasm for all things nutrition makes her the perfect choice for our Chief Innovation Officer. Patty has forged a 20-year career as an educator, writer and chef, founding a national non-profit organization to drive awareness around children’s dietary health and co-authoring a successful nutrition cookbook. She draws from her wealth of experience to work as a coach, giving families and children a newfound appreciation of what it means to eat well. Her academic qualifications include an M.S in Holistic Nutrition, a Natural Chef certificate and membership on the Bauman College Board of Directors.

Alexander Gocnharuk heads up the technological aspect of Foogal, lending his immense expertise in the area. Alexander is the co-founder of Digitally Inspired, a software development company with over 100 full-time programmers and a main development base in Odessa, Ukraine, and a sales office in the United Kingdom. Before Digitally Inspired. he was Head of eCommerce for Waitrose, a supermarket chain based in the United Kingdom with £5.4 billion ($6.9 billion) in annual revenue. Mr. Goncharuk also had experience working with food retailers in the United States as part of his work for BJSS, a technology management consulting firm. He received his MBA from Columbia and London Business School and holds a Masters in Computer Science from Odessa State Polytechnic University.

Leading the medical side of Foogal is Robert Lusting whose pioneering work in the academic field informs his important contribution to our platform. Robert is Professor emeritus of Pediatrics in the Division of Endocrinology at the University of California, San Francisco. His studies have sparked a wave of interest in the field of neuroendocrinology, the study of how the nervous system connects to the endocrine system, and his recent research has tackled the misconceptions that surround diet- related diseases. His academic background includes a Bachelor’s in Science from MIT, a Doctorate in Medicine from Cornell University Medical College and a Master’s of Studies in Law from U.C. Hastings College of the Law.

Darya Rose is the author of Foodist: Using Real Food and Real Science to Lose Weight Without Dieting, and creator of the award-winning blog Summer Tomato, one of TIME’s 50 Best Websites. She received her doctorate in neuroscience from UCSF, and has a bachelor’s degree in Molecular and Cell Biology from UC Berkeley. Darya’s unique, brain-based approach to food, health and weight loss teaches not just what healthy eating looks like, but how to actually change your behaviors so you can stop wishing for and actually make meaningful progress toward healthier living. Darya spends most of her time thinking and writing about food, health and science. She eats amazing things daily, and hasn’t even considered going on a diet since 2007.