Meet Hamish, youngest entrepreneur at GES

By Mohammed Shafeeq

Hyderabad, Nov 28 (IANS) He is just 13 but is the centre of attraction among 1,500 delegates at the Global Entrepreneurship Summit (GES), which began here on Tuesday,

Hamish Finlayson, the youngest entrepreneur is an app developer from Australia. He is autistic but this has not prevented him from developing five apps including an app to help those with autism spectrum disorder (ASD).

He has come out with an app TripleT&ASD. "It has day-to-day tips to help those with autism and also for the other people to know about the disorder," the boy told IANS.

The Class 7 student from Queensland is passionate about the need to protect environment and has already developed four apps on environment.

LitterbugSmash was his first app which he developed when he was just 10-years-old. A multi-media, multi-channel educational tool, it is a game and fundraising initiative designed to protect oceans and save turtles.

He is currently working on a sixth app which is a virtual reality game aimed at teaching children and adults with autism life and social skills to make their life easier.

For Hamish, this is his second GES. He had participated in the 2016 event held in Silicon Valley.

"In Hyderabad, I want to learn about virtual reality and talk to people to know about the skills," he said.

Happy to be in India, he is also keen to learn about the country, entrepreneurs and the eco-system here.

Hamish's father Green Finlayson told IANS that his son always liked technology, maths and coding. "He started coding when was just eight. He used to draw stuff on screen," said Green.

Hamish wants to continue working on developing apps to help people and work for protection of environment.

"His age is of learning. We don't have specific plans to get investment but if we get an opportunity we will be happy to talk to investors," said Finlayson when asked if they have any plans to rope in investors.