Everyone, meet Grant Takara, one of the University of Hawaii’s Student Entrepreneurs. He’s majoring in mechanical engineering and minoring in business and economics. He’s lived in Hawaii his entire life, graduated from Kalani High School in 2012, and is currently a junior at UH Mānoa. Although he’s only in his early 20’s, Grant has big plans for the future. He’d eventually like to design medical technology to improve the overall quality of life. But on top of all his schoolwork, Grant has already got a head start in the world of innovation.
Grant’s Masterstoke Exotic Writing Instruments all started when he was looking at Kickstarter, a funding platform for creative projects. He noticed that another Kickstarter had raised over $70,000 making a titanium pen. So, Grant did his research and found that other pen projects with similar designs had raised as much at $330,000 per project! So, Grant saw the opportunity that unique pens offered and he went for it! Grant has been designing aviation inspired pens that are far from minimalist for a little over a year now, putting anywhere from 6-20 hours a week into his project! But, it’s starting to pay off. Grant’s Masterstroke Pens can be found at http://www.masterstrokepens.com!
Masterstroke Pens aren’t Grant’s only company! Grant was also a part of founding Bristlebots LLC, a company that started as a fundraiser for his high school robotics team during his freshman year. Bristlebots provides children with robotics kits that they can assemble, providing a stepping stone into STEM education for children 4-10 years old. Grant and a couple of his graduating classmates founded the company only a few days after their commencement ceremony! Grant says it’s, “great to see the students and families assemble the robots and have a blast competing with each other through various games that you can play with the kits.”
Most of us have a hard time just getting out bed for class in the morning. So, what’s keeping Grant motivated? Although the first pen he launched wasn’t much of a success, he decided to launch another one based on the feedback he got from the first one. Luckily, this pen is doing much better. Grant feels like he’s starting to build some brand recognition and that helps him to keep his sights set on the big picture and keep working hard. He says that it’s a work in progress, but he’s excited to see what the future holds.
Bristlebots can be found at http://www.bristlebots.org and Grant’s Kickstarter for Airfoil Click Pens can be found at https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1433863567/airfoil-click-pen-aviation-inspired-for-gel-and-ro !
Her Campus Hawaii wishes Grant the best of luck and hopes everyone takes some time to check out and appreciate the wonderful work he has done!