Source: Radio New Zealand
Kami co-founders Hengjie Wang and Alliv Samson with their award. SUPPLIED
The co-founders of education technology platform Kami have been named EY entrepreneur of the year, with a fast growing global business expanding in more than 180 countries, except New Zealand.
Kami’s educational products is used by 70 million teachers and students around the world, including 90 percent of US classrooms.
Kami was co-founded in 2013 by chief executive Hengjie Wang and chief operating officer Alliv Samson, after developing their first interactive educational tool while still in university.
Samson said the company was still just getting started, with long-term plans to continue.
“We’re still scratching the surface,” Samson said. “There’s still a lot of classrooms out there that need help, including New Zealand.
“One of the biggest challenges that we see in Education NZ is we don’t have really good structure in ways on how we use technology in the classroom, and we can see how progressive the other countries are, but unfortunately, we’re really lacking here in New Zealand, and that’s something that we would love to see change.”
Wang said he would use the win to discuss the issue with Prime Minister Christopher Luxon who spoke about the importance of technology and entrpreneurship at the annual awards gala.
Kami will be competing with the other country winners at EY’s Global event to be held in Monaco, June 2026.
Category winners
- Alliv Samson and Hengjie Wang (Kami) Alliv Samson and Hengjie Wang, Kami
- Kate Gatfield-Jeffries (Moodi), Young Entrepreneur
- Chris Benham (The Village Goldsmith), Product Entrepreneur
- Taurus Taurima (Topline Contracting), Services Entrepreneur
- James Annabell (Egmont Honey), Master Entrepreneur
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– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand
