My name is Hillary Yip and I launched my startup MinorMynas three years ago when I was 10 years old. My journey creating MinorMynas began when my mum sent my brother and me to summer camp in Taiwan to improve our Chinese, after struggling with it for years.

My month in Taiwan was a game-changer. Because we could only speak in Chinese, my brother and I learnt the language almost overnight. It was much different than our previous experience trying to learn Chinese.

When I came back, I came across a kids’ entrepreneurship competition and I decided to give it a shot. Thinking about my time in Taiwan, I wondered if I could create an online version of that experience. We learned Chinese so effortlessly by being immersed in the language. I wanted to let kids from all over the world learn and exchange their languages — and make it fun, too.

After that competition, I built a beta version of my app called MinorMynas and launched it last June. Now kids from more than 50 countries interact on MinorMynas!

Seeing that growth and excitement has made me realise that my business has evolved far beyond just a language learning app. MinorMynas provides a safe place for kids to exchange cultures, languages, ideas and to make friends across borders.

I believe that to solve the many divisions in the world, we need to be exposed to new people and ideas from all walks of life. That starts with kids.

My vision with MinorMynas is to connect the world through kids, letting us learn together as a community, making the world a better place.