Learn & Explore

Precision Enological Technology doesn't emerge from a commercial brief. It emerges from a problem that resists every existing solution — and from the specific combination of expertise required to solve it.

ADVINTAGE® was built by a sensory scientist and a fermentation scientist. The product took seven to eight years to develop. It began not as a business plan but as a personal research project — two scientists applying their combined knowledge to a problem they lived with every day. That origin matters, because it shaped everything about how the technology was designed: not for market positioning, but for genuine sensory performance.

The Science Behind the Founders

Heather Hyung Chang is a sensory scientist with over 20 years of R&D experience across Fortune 500 CPG, pharmaceutical, and biotechnology companies including PepsiCo, GSK, Nestlé, and Givaudan. Her expertise is in sensory-driven ingredient and product development — the science of how humans perceive the world through smell and taste, and how those perceptions can be measured, reproduced, and refined.

She came to the United States from South Korea to pursue graduate studies in sensory science. During her time at GSK, she ran a wine club that used wines as a vehicle for sensory evaluation training — deepening her practical understanding of the quality profiles that distinguish a structurally mature wine from one that hasn't yet reached its potential.

Dr. Anthony Clark, President and Co-Founder, is a microbiologist and fermentation scientist from Scotland with over 25 years of experience at IFF, PepsiCo, and Firmenich. He has submitted more than 50 international patent applications and authored more than 70 scientific publications. His expertise in fermentation science provided the technical foundation for the ADVINTAGE® formulation.

Together, they bring over 45 years of combined R&D experience from some of the world's most demanding scientific environments. That background is not incidental to ADVINTAGE® — it is the reason the technology works.

The Problem That Started Everything

Anthony loves wine. Heather had spent years developing a highly calibrated palate through professional sensory work. She found that most wines — particularly affordable ones — fell short of what she could tolerate. The structural issues that most drinkers accept as normal — harsh tannins, sharp acidity, disconnected flavor profiles — were, to a trained sensory scientist, clearly identifiable problems with clearly identifiable causes.

What followed was not a consumer product development exercise. It was a scientific investigation. Heather and Anthony spent seven to eight years developing a formulation in their home — applying the same rigor they brought to their professional work at PepsiCo, GSK, and IFF — to understand what structural changes would make wine perceptually different, and what compounds could produce those changes reliably.

What the Research Produced

The result is ADVINTAGE® Precision Enological Technology: a fermented botanical formulation containing over 100 phytochemical compounds derived from food-grade plant extracts. It operates through a mechanism called Non-Reactive Sensory Profile Modulation — engaging the gustatory and chemosensory receptors that shape how wine is perceived, without altering the wine's molecular structure.^[1]

The wine's core chemistry — pH, titratable acidity, alcohol, phenolic composition — remains completely unchanged. Varietal character and terroir expression are fully preserved. What changes is the sensory interface: how the wine's existing structural components are perceived at the receptor level. Harsh tannins register as integrated and soft. Off-note signals are suppressed. Fruit character registers more fully. The wine reaches a more advanced point on its sensory maturation curve — without the years of cellar time that would normally be required to get there.

The formulation is compliant under 27 CFR §24.246 as an enological tannin preparation. No labeling disclosure is required. It is 100% natural, contains no artificial additives, and is patent pending in the U.S. and EU.

From Personal Research to Independent Validation

The first validation of the technology came from the people around them. Friends who tried it were, in Heather's words, "in shock." That response was the signal that the formulation had moved beyond personal utility into something with broader application.

Heather left her position at GSK to build the business. The decision to take a product developed through years of private research into the commercial wine industry — specifically the B2B winery market — required the same discipline that produced the technology itself: rigorous methodology, independent verification, and a willingness to let the data speak.

That verification has since come from multiple sources. Independent studies include an Oregon State University blind sensory panel evaluation and a consumer blind preference test conducted in New York City. Additional validation was provided through a 12-month stability study and a Bordeaux expert panel of five wine professionals assembled by the ADVINTAGE® team, which reached unanimous agreement in blind evaluation. Each study addressed a different dimension of the technology: mechanism, stability, consumer preference, and expert validation. The full data from each is documented and available.

The science that Heather and Anthony developed over seven years in their home has now been validated across independent institutions, trained professional panels, and consumer preference studies. The science that began in their home has since earned its place in the cellar.

Why This Background Matters for Winery Professionals

For a winery evaluating a new cellar tool, the credentials behind the technology are not a marketing detail. They are the basis for trust.

ADVINTAGE® was not developed by a flavor company seeking a new application for existing ingredients. It was not designed by a marketing team working backward from a consumer insight. It was built by a sensory scientist who spent her career at the intersection of human perception and product performance — and a fermentation scientist with 50 patent applications and 70 scientific publications — who identified a specific structural problem in wine and spent nearly a decade solving it with the tools their combined expertise provided.

That is the foundation on which every application of ADVINTAGE® in the cellar rests. Not a marketing promise. A scientific record.