Ada Jin’s path from a Columbia cloud computing project to founding Lamu shows how an engineering idea can grow into a human-centered venture.
Columbia alumna Ada Jin is applying her engineering education to a deeply human challenge: helping people form genuine connections amid an abundance of digital choices. By bringing together technology and community-building, she continues to explore a question that has stayed with her since graduate school: “How can technical systems be designed around human needs?”
Ada’s interest in this challenge took shape at Columbia, where coursework in machine learning, statistics, and cloud computing gave her a strong technical foundation and opportunities for practical application. In a cloud computing course, her study group built a product from end to end, and she chose to develop a dating app for the final project. The experience showed her that engineering could be applied to a problem she already cared about: making it easier to build meaningful relationships online.
Beyond technical fluency, Columbia taught Ada to examine how algorithms influence behavior and decision-making. The University’s interdisciplinary environment encouraged her to connect engineering with entrepreneurship, psychology, and other social sciences—an approach that continues to shape how she frames and solves problems.
“My training at Columbia was deeply practical,” Ada says. “Machine learning and statistics gave me the ability to work on a real human problem. By studying deep learning, reinforcement learning, and the underlying mathematics, I came to see AI not simply as a research subject, but as a tool that could address loneliness and the erosion of real connection.”
Today, Ada is building Lamu, a startup that uses AI to make online dating more intentional and less repetitive. Rather than encouraging prolonged swipe-based browsing, the product is designed to support thoughtful matches, conversation, and real-world connection. Her work combines the analytical discipline of engineering with sensitivity to people’s emotional lives, measuring success not by how long users remain on the app, but by whether it helps them build richer lives and relationships beyond the screen.
Ada’s path reflects the lasting value of a Columbia education: rigorous technical training, interdisciplinary curiosity, and the confidence to apply both to a complex human problem. She holds a Master of Science in Computer Science from Columbia University’s Fu Foundation School of Engineering and Applied Science. We wish her continued success as she brings that vision to life.