Joy Tang used to have seven large computer screens on her desk during her days as a high-frequency trader on Wall Street. Six of those screens hosted programs for her to write algorithms and heuristic models to predict stock prices, but one screen she kept open for something else: fashion.

“I would leave (a computer screen) for social media so I didn’t feel like I was doing numbers every day,” Tang said. “I saw beautiful outfits from Facebook, from my friends. I followed fashion bloggers on Instagram, and I felt like every time I saw a pretty dress, it triggered my emotions.”

The former China Math Olympics gold medalist and Massachusetts Institute of Technology economics and math graduate founded MARKABLE as a way to change the way people shop. The mobile app has visual search technology that allows users to go directly from looking at a photo to making a purchase.

Users can snap or download a photo on their phone and then upload the photo to the app. The app subsequently finds the exact or similar products as shown in the photo, sorted by price.

Tang and her team have a visual search technology that identifies the image product and uses a series of algorithms that process shape, size and color to produce a list of the 50 items closest resembling the ones in the image. Users can purchase the clothing and accessories in-app via credit card or PayPal.

“There are so many beautiful images on the Internet,” Tang said. “I’m sure I’m not the only one who wanted to buy these things right away but didn’t know how.”

Inside the app, the average product is priced between $20-$150. More than 800 brands and companies participate, including Macy’s, Bloomingdale’s and Nike.

At the beginning, Tang took top brands’ marketing managers out for meals to discuss the app. Fiona Wang, vice president of MARKABLE, reached out to the rest of the brands with emails and diligent follow-ups.

Once the top brands approved, the rest of the brands followed, Tang said. The backend technical team spent six months aggregating all product data and organized them into one automatically updating database.

The MARKABLE app launched to the public on May 11 and has been gaining traction quickly. In the first two weeks, users spent $2,000 in purchases.

“Our most active users are between ages 14 and 35. We like all kinds of users,” Tang said, referring to older crowds making purchases but also younger viewers just browsing and getting inspired. “We mainly want to capture the kind of people who know what they want and want to get it right away.”

Tang self-funded the first batch of fundraising and then relied on friends for a seed round. MARKABLE then garnered interest from angel investors, one of whom has invested in Lyft, Samsung and other video technology. MARKABLE is finishing Pre-Series A funding soon, according to Tang.

MARKABLE currently operates out of 100state. Tang has a team of nine full-time and five part-time employees. She is still actively hiring in the Madison area for people with 2-3 years of experience in marketing, computer vision engineering and backend web development.

On the horizon for MARKABLE will be working with several events in the next few months. The app will be the exclusive pre-order platform for outfits on New York, Los Angeles, Dubai, and Miami Fashion Week runways.