Blue Startups

Say “Aloha!” to the founders of Blue Startups Cohort 18. 12 companies, selected from more than +800 applications, are building across AI, travel, ocean, gaming, space, wellness, and hardware. Our 12-week program starts July 20 in Honolulu, Hawaiʻi, with Demo Day on Friday, September 4. Portfolio Companies NatureMe - Lama Masri, Evan Rapoport, Warren Moon, Mike Prince Nice Industries - Jessica Greenwalt Trajectory Media - Justin Bailey, Ben Brostoff, Reece Denzel The Travel Nanny - Beverly Yip Paws Abroad - Marisa Hoskins, Adrian Hoskins CivicNexus - Seiichi Nagai, Pierce Young Pacific Hybreed - Melissa DellaTorre Advisory Companies Lu'uLive - Matthew Feeley Manai - Frank Schmidt LessCAD (Matter Manifest) - Bryan Wan Wander - Vincenzo Mazzoni LaunchDetect - Noah Thompson, Justin Kellum This is the heart of our year. 12 teams, 3 months, one goal: build real companies and connect Hawaiʻi to the world. Mahalo to startups and founders who applied, and to the mentors and investors who make this program what it is. Mahalo to Chenoa Farnsworth, Maya Rogers, Henk Rogers, David Holt, and Alexi Drouin, and to everyone on our screening committee: Rob Robinson, Mark Munoz, Michelle Dumais, Josh Sullivan, Joey Katzen, and Paulette Jencks. Welcome Cohort 18 to the Blue ʻohana! See you all at Demo Day on September 4th.

I was so energized and excited to meet Erica Lockheimer in person at the Leadership Conference 2026 by Hawaii Business Magazine with David Holt. Erica is the Founder and CEO of HumanizeHer Podcast and the former VP of Engineering at LinkedIn. Her podcast has become one of the best places to hear women in tech tell their real stories, including our own Chenoa Farnsworth, Managing Partner at Blue Startups, who joined Erica this spring to talk about building a mindful tech ecosystem in Hawaiʻi. (Watch Here: https://lnkd.in/gQhBfRC3) It's got 438K views on Youtube in less than a 1 month. We need more of what Erica is building, raising women’s voices, backing founders, and putting relationships first. That’s how we hold each other higher. So glad our paths finally crossed, Erica. Mahalo! 🤙

Thank you to the Maui Economic Development Board, Inc. for inviting Josh & I to speak at the Maui Tech Ohana! We shared our talk, "Enhancing the Personal Touch with AI" - covering Abra Hospitality's vision as the AI Guest Intelligence Platform for Hospitality, our experience building a high-growth tech company on Maui, and why we believe AI's greatest promise in hospitality is powering more meaningful human connection. The Maui tech ecosystem is real, it's growing, and MEDB's work convening this community is a huge part of why. It was inspiring to see how deeply people here are thinking about AI - and how intentional our community is about using technology to strengthen human connection, not replace it. We're proud to build here, and grateful for a community that makes it possible. Mahalo! 🌺

Congratulations to Josh Ellis, Dana Ellis, and Paul Dumais of Abra Hospitality (Blue Startups Cohort 17) for winning the People's Choice Award at the E20X Pitch Competition at HITEC. The People's Choice was built on Maui. Abra turns scattered guest data and the on-the-ground knowledge of frontline hotel teams into coordinated, anticipatory service. Last-mile CRM for hospitality, validated on one of the industry's biggest stages. Mahalo to Hawaii Hotel Hui and Dan Wacksman for the writeup. We're proud to watch our founders flourish post-program. 🙌 Read the story: https://lnkd.in/gnEgWVtj

Blue Startups Cohort 18 starts soon... Meet the two people running it. Chenoa Farnsworth co-founded Blue Startups in 2012 and leads the firm as Managing Partner. 17 cohorts later: 150+ portfolio companies, $1B+ in follow-on capital, and a Top 20 US accelerator ranking from TechCrunch. David Holt is Blue Startups' Program Director. Each founder's 12 weeks in the accelerator run through him: every event, class, and session, plus the 250+ mentor network, office hours, all the way to Demo Day. And of course, none of it exists without Henk Rogers and Maya Rogers, who co-founded Blue Startups with Chenoa Farnsworth. The team behind Tetris bet on Hawaiʻi founders and startups more than 14 years ago. Up next... a new cohort of founders here on Oʻahu. Follow Blue Startups, Chenoa Farnsworth, David Holt, and Alexi Drouin for more behind-the-scene content on our Cohort 18 startups as we announce them.

Blue Startups Demo Day is back at Hawaii Tech Week! HTW is 5,000+ people, 50+ events, 25+ venues, and the full calendar is live today. Check it out now at https://lnkd.in/eB9gpD-H HTW 2026 is a full week (Aug 31 – Sep 6) of founder, investor, and operator tech events across Honolulu, Hawai’i. Blue Startups is proud to sponsor it and for our Demo Day to be its capstone event. 📅 Friday, September 4 🕒 3:00 to 6:00 PM HST 📍 Entrepreneurs Sandbox Cohort 18 will take the stage to pitch investors, mentors, and leaders from Hawaiʻi and beyond. These startups are building across travel, gaming, AI, software, sustainability, health, and ocean tech. This event sells out every year. Mark to Date and RSVP early. After the pitches, walk across the street to the Official HTW Mixer at 1938 Indochine for more networking, pupus, and drinks with the community. RSVP → https://luma.com/r4pzlr4z

Every startup in our cohort must go through the screening room. This is where we decide which team of founders gets into Blue Startups. Nearly 800 founders applied to Cohort 18. Over a few afternoons, we read each application and narrowed the field to a shorter list of selected teams. Then, a committee of investors, founders, and mentors interviews every selected team and pressure-tests each team against the same high bar. Here is the bar... What's their moat? Urgency? Why now? Can we help them scale? Are they solving a problem? Do they have founder-market fit? Is this a venture-size tech business? Can Blue Startups actually help them win? Mahalo to our screening committee for showing up, cohort after cohort. We're almost done. Stay tuned... We will be announcing Cohort 18 soon!

92 students applied from 18 high schools across Hawaiʻi to Blue Academy's 5-Day Entrepreneurship Bootcamp. We expanded from 30 to 60 seats, and this is your last call to register. Applications close today! Blue Startups and Hawaii Pacific University are running a FREE program, July 27 to 31 at HPU's Aloha Tower Campus with Alexi Drouin. Made possible by HPU's John F. Scarpa Entrepreneurial Pathway. In one week, students go from a idea to launch: website, post/video, and final presentation to a panel of experts. If you know a Hawaiʻi high schooler, ages 16 and 17, with a business idea, send them our way. Apply at blue.academy/bootcamp

From Hawai’i to Amazon, Williams-Sonoma, and PG&E, these 3 Blue Startups alumni accelerated straight to the biggest names in their industries. From Talent Marketplace to Amazon's First Partner Instant Teams (Cohort 11). Liza Rodewald and Erica McMannes built a marketplace that connects military spouses with flexible, remote careers. A $1.5M seed right after the program, then a $13M Series A led by Tiger Global. When Amazon launched its military-spouse remote work program, Instant Teams was its first hiring partner. Where Williams-Sonoma, Inc. Send Their Returns LiquiDonate (Cohort 14). Disney Petit,'s platform routes retail returns and excess inventory to nonprofits and schools instead of the landfill. Room & Board, Williams-Sonoma, and Liquid Death send their returns through it. It raised a $3.75M seed led by Laconia Capital and won a 2026 NRF VIP Award for Supply Chain Innovation. A Home-Energy Coach Partnering with PG&E Maiven Energy (Cohort 16). Jacqueline Hall spent 14 years inside the utility world before she built Maiven, an AI home-energy assistant that helps utilities hit their decarbonization targets without drowning in manual program paperwork. Now she sells back into the same industry she came from, this time on the other side of the table. This is what building from Hawaiʻi at Blue Startups looks like!