Hawaii-based climate tech startup, Hohonu, recently announced it has completed a $1.8 million pre-seed funding round to scale its efforts to provide data and insights to mitigate coastal flooding nationally and internationally.
The $1.8 million pre-seed round was filled out by climate-focused investors including Elemental Excelerator, Builder’s Vision, TELUS Pollinator Fund for Good, Sustainable Ocean Alliance, and more, according to the announcement.
Hohonu has captured more than 900,000 hours of water level data across 12 coastal states, and partners with local nonprofits to better understand how its sensors and real-time data can benefit local communities, according to the startup. It has worked with technology education nonprofit Purple Maia Foundation over the past two years, which has allowed the two to "mature the technology and strategize how to take research technology outside of academia into a scalable economic opportunity," according to PMF co-founder and CEO Donavan Kealoha.
The startup was also a part of climate tech investor Elemental Excelerator's most recent cohort, as previously reported by PBN.
“We are so grateful for the support that has been provided to us by local partners such as [Purple Maia Foundation] and the University of Hawaii,” Hohonu co-founder and UH Manoa Oceanography Professor Brian Glazer said in a statement. “We will continue to embed into our corporate DNA the collaborative process that prioritizes reciprocity with local partners in order to solve problems occurring at a global scale.”
