TOMODACHI Boeing Entrepreneurship Seminar Hackathon 2025
TOMODACHI Boeing Entrepreneurship Seminar is a program to provide opportunities for hands-on learning and to foster an entrepreneurial mindset, with the goal of equipping the next generation with innovation and leadership skills. For its 15th year in 2025, the program had a new focus on combining entrepreneurship with STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering & Math) education. 20 students, ranging from high schoolers to doctorate students, who are studying in STEM fields, joined the program from across Japan.
As part of the program, a three-day hackathon was held in Tokyo from September 26th to 28th, 2025. The participants brought their diverse expertise and unique perspectives to the event, exploring solutions to societal challenges. The event was a productive three days with active discussions and creative idea generation
The first day focused on team building through icebreakers and dialogues, progressing from idea generation to team formation. A keynote session by Saori Hosomi, Designer at LINE Yahoo! Corporation and Director at the Designship General Incorporated Association, was an inspiring start to the event. She shared her experiences participating in hackathons and planning design conferences, along with her philosophy on design.
On the second day, teams conducted research on their selected project topics and began to solidify their plans through the creation of mockups and a midpoint presentation. The goal was to make their ideas more tangible. During lunchtime, a “Lunch & Learn” session with Boeing employees was held. The employees shared a wide range of insights, including specific responsibilities in the aerospace industry, diverse career paths, and the importance of continuously taking on new challenges. In the afternoon session, participants further refined their projects through individual mentoring sessions, an input talk on teamwork, and a World Cafe-style dialogue with fellow participants.
The third day was dedicated to preparing for the final pitch presentations. Participants learned effective presentation techniques in a “Pitching to be Heard” session. Following this, they refined their ideas and created their presentation materials based on discussions and feedback from mentors. During the final presentations, teams received specific feedback and questions from the other participants.
The five ideas generated from the hackathon were as follows:
- Pocket Time App: An app that suggests fun things to do with your spare time based on their preferences and interests. It makes it easier to search for activities and help users use their time efficiently.
- Nature Experience App: A game and animal encyclopedia app that uses technology to get kids more excited and interested in learning about nature and caring for the environment.
- Medical Information Transparency App: A healthcare app that eliminates the information gap between doctors and patients. It aims to create cost transparency and fair insurance premiums.
- Sensory-Based Advertising: A new form of advertising that uses sound, visuals, and tactile elements to convey messages that cannot be fully expressed through traditional copy alone.
- Academic Networking App: An app that helps participants at academic conferences and technology exhibitions connect based on shared interests and skills, facilitating networking. It is focused on creating opportunities for new participants to interact with others.
Participant, Yuki Ito, reflected on the hackathon by stating, “For me, this was an experience of ‘unlearning.’ Instead of simply applying everything I already knew to the team, I was able to enjoy bouncing ideas back and forth with everyone and utilize my past knowledge and experience in a new way. When you learn new things, you tend to feel like you have to use them, but this time, I challenged myself to let go of all my past learning. In the end, I realized that while past learning is still important, you shouldn’t be held back by it. I feel like I have truly learned the joy of continuously learning what is needed at the moment.”
Following the hackathon, participants will have a mentoring period from October to November to further polish their ideas and presentations materials. Their final presentations will be held at Boeing Japan on December 7, 2025.
