Build Hawaiʻi

Our Mission

Hawaiʻi's small businesses are being left behind by AI. Hawaiʻi's young people are leaving because they don't see opportunity here. Build Hawaiʻi solves both problems at the same time.

We pair youth builders (ages 14–24) with local small businesses in an 8-week cohort program. The kid is the AI expert. The business owner is the domain expert. Neither could do it without the other. Together, they build something real.

Every cohort is built around one unit: the Builder Pair. A young builder brings energy, curiosity, and technical instinct with AI tools. A local business owner brings domain knowledge, real problems, and community roots.

The output is always the same: a working AI-powered tool or workflow the business can use the day the cohort ends. Not a pitch deck. Not a prototype. A real thing that works.

• No winners. No losers. Every team ships. This is not a competition.
• Mixed ages on purpose. A 15-year-old and a 45-year-old business owner working together is a feature, not a bug.
• Hawaiʻi problems only. Every project connects to a local issue, a local business, a local community.
• The metric is "did you build something real?"

Build Hawaiʻi was started by Brent Akamine — CEO of Vinovest ($100M+ AUM), angel investor, and Kamaʻāina. Brent grew up on Oʻahu and saw firsthand how Hawaiʻi's small businesses were being left behind by technology while the island's best young talent left for the mainland.

Build Hawaiʻi is his answer: a program that keeps talent local by giving young people real problems to solve and real businesses to solve them with.

Every tool built here is designed for national scale. A scheduling system built for a Kailua surf shop works for 130,000 similar shops on the mainland. A menu optimization tool built for a Wahiawā plate lunch spot works for every local restaurant in America.

Hawaiʻi is the lab. The mainland is the market. Build Hawaiʻi teams don't just ship a tool — they ship a product with national distribution potential.

We chose an English-first name intentionally. Hawaiian language naming would only be appropriate through deep, earned partnership with Hawaiian cultural institutions like Kamehameha Schools or the Office of Hawaiian Affairs. Until that relationship exists, we honor the culture by not appropriating it.

Questions? Reach out at hello@buildhawaii.org