University of Southern California rolls out mobile dining app

Sept. 9—The University of Southern California is making available to students a mobile app that will allow them to order and pay for food remotely at all of its retail operations. USC Hospitality announced that it had signed an agreement with Tapingo, a company that operates a contextual shopping app that processes on-the-go orders and makes items available for pick up within minutes.

Among the foodservice outlets linked to Tapingo include Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf, Carl’s Junior, Panda Express, California Pizza Kitchen and the Trojan Grounds. The app will even allow students to use meal plan swipes as payment, while students and faculty will also have the option to pay with credit card and PayPal.

“Tapingo represents exactly the kind of tech-driven innovation USC seeks to deliver and inspire among its world-class student body,” said Dirk de Jong, associate director of operations for USC Hospitality, in a press release. “By streamlining the process of ordering and picking up food, students can spend more time working and socializing. In that sense, Tapingo is the perfect complement to USC’s brand and educational experience.”

“We are proud to have USC join the existing 25 universities to have successfully launched Tapingo on campus,” said Daniel Almog, CEO of Tapingo. “We are all creatures of habit, and Tapingo’s solution combines that understanding with the contextual awareness of today’s smartphones to simplify the day-to-day shopping needs of every consumer.”