Chinese companies and individuals are investing tens of billions of dollars in America. Here’s how Hawaii businesses and nonprofits are creating relationships with their Chinese counterparts and working to get a share of those investments, with varying degrees of success.…
The coming construction boom will be very different from the last one: different kinds of projects, new ways of financing and maybe fewer rising costs. It’s often hard to say exactly when the business cycle turns. Some date the end…
Profitability is the bottom line, but it’s not the end of the story. Consider banks: In 2010 and 2011, Hawaii’s two largest financial institutions, First Hawaiian Bank and Bank of Hawaii, were also the state’s most profitable companies. Last year, they ranked first…
ver wondered what the people down the street paid for their house? Who owns that office building on the corner? Whether your home is in the flood plain? Which city council member to complain to about that pothole? All that…
Why did Alexander & Baldwin andMatson stick together so long, and why did they finally decide to separate? There was always a great story about why these companies ended up together. A&B was a landowner and an agricultural company, and needed a way…
These bacteria are a key part of UH’s plan to double the money it collects from federal grants over the coming decade “Micro-organisms dominate this planet,” says David Karl, director of C-MORE, the UH-based Center for Microbial Oceanography, Research and…
It’s impossible to really say what a human life is really worth, but that hasn’t stopped people from trying. It happens all the time in wrongful-death suits, which are designed to compensate family members and dependents for their economic loss.…
Training for Fellows in the omidyar program goes through three stages: • Looking at yourself, including strengths and weaknesses; • Looking at You as part of a team; and • Looking at your leadership in the community. Mark your calendars, future leaders of Hawaii: June…
Today, I learned how to manufacture an oxygen tank. After that, I assembled detailed financial reports for a handful of Hawaii companies. Then, I began a six-week interactive course in Quickbooks. Finally, I created a 10-page draft for a last…
Pelatron Networking-On-The-Move Product: Networking-On-The-Move is a battlefield-ready networking and telecommunications system designed and manufactured by Pelatron, a Native Hawaiian-owned engineering and technology firm based in Mapunapuna. Senior VP and chief engineer Branson Aken describes NOTM as a mobile, modular “command-and-control”…
Are sweeping changes in Department of Education’s leadership enough to fix Hawaii’s schools? New three-part strategy emphasizes student achievement first, followed by improved support and IT systems, and better training/accountability/HR. Don Horner, chair of the two-year-old, appointed Board of Education,…
For decades, "too difficult" has been the refrain in the development community. Developers believe Hawaii’s land-use laws are too complicated, environmental regulations too onerous, and deference to Native Hawaiian gathering and access…
Pacxa becomes Hawaii’s largest locally based IT service provider with patience and a mix of strategies This January, at our monthly all-staff meeting at Pacific Basin Communications, company president Scott Schumaker ended the morning’s events with a surprising announcement: “Oh,…
The return on investment is good but turns up in unexpected places This legislative session, as lawmakers debate a bill that would make preschool universal among Hawaii children, you may hear some outrageous claims from the advocates of early childhood…
Robert Howe has been playing the markets since he was in high school. In 1973, he inherited $5,000 from his aunt and his father suggested he buy stock with the windfall. Howe chose a young consumer-products company called Radio Shack.…
What is C.E.P.A.S.? Navatek, the R&D subsidiary of shipyard operator Pacific Marine, specializes in developing advanced hull forms and flow-control technology. Its new Catalyst Enhanced Plasma Actuation System is designed to improve the efficiency of large, commercial wind turbines by…
Sonny Bhagowalia has a plan to fix the state’s archaic IT system in June 2011, Bhagowalia became the state of Hawaii’s first chief information officer and the point man in Gov. Neil Abercrombie’s ambitious plan to “reinvent government.” Bhagowalia and…
The toughest challenge was recapitalizing the bank,” says John Dean, Central Pacific Bank’s soft-spoken CEO. Dean, who came out of retirement in 2010 to help save the struggling community bank, knew what he was getting into. This was his fifth bank and…
Hawaiʻi's corporate foundations bring some stability to local giving. But foundations aren’t the only way for big corporations to give. And many companies supplement their cash giving with donations of time, resources and services.
At Hawaiian Dredging, one of the Islands’ largest contractors, Wilson has a bird’s-eye view of the building industry and its role in the state’s economy. Hawaii Business talked to him about what can be done to improve the state of…
How quickly things change. Ever since the Hawaii Clean Energy Initiative was announced in 2008, the assumption has been that Hawaii’s new sources of power would come from renewable energy: wind, solar, geothermal, biofuels and others. These cleaner, local sources…
"In this day and age of trying to eat fresh, there are some neighborhoods where there just aren’t a lot of options,” says Lesa Griffith, director of communications for Honolulu Museum of…
The assessed value of Coconut Island – also known as Moku o Loe – is $2,666,500. The details, though, are more complicated. In the 1930s, Christian Holmes II, heir to the Fleischmann Yeast fortune, bought the island from Bishop Estate…
The line of customers outside Matsumoto Grocery Store is 15 deep. Visitors and locals alike wait patiently to place their orders, huddling under the eaves of the ramshackle old building to avoid the noon sun. In the dusty gravel parking…
Ever wondered why your IRA only invests in publicly traded securities, such as stocks, bonds and mutual funds? What about other investments: precious metals, derivatives, mortgages, business loans and real estate? Dan Falardeau, president of New Directions IRA, says the…
Ten years after retiring as governor, Cayetano has been drawn back to the campaign trail by his opposition to Honolulu’s rail project. He talks about rail, why it’s a bad idea and what he would do instead to help commuters.…
The former secretary of transportation of Massachusetts and general manager of the Massachusetts Bay Transit Authority talks about the prospects for Honolulu’s rail project. Coming from a well-established rail system like the one in Boston, did you have any surprises…
After years of working on contentious issues, such as whether to build a new power plant in West Oahu or wind farms on Lanai, Alm has learned valuable lessons about building community consensus. Now, as the leader of the new…
"Let me frame healthcare for you in a big way,” says Josh Green, state senator from Hawaii Island. “The big picture is that the rate of increase in the cost of healthcare is unsustainable. The U.S. is spending $3 trillion…
What is ReadiBand? ReadiBand is a civilian product that commercializes technology developed for the military to identify, assess and manage fatigue. It is made by Fatigue Science, a spin-off of Archinoetics, a Hawaii-based, dual-use company. How does it work? ReadiBand…
A little belatedly, the rest of the country is getting it: Tourism is big business. This realization is at the heart of President Obama’s executive order in January, which calls for a national strategy to make America the world’s top…
At first glance, Hawaii Fish Co. in Mokuleia doesn’t look like a hotbed of innovation. For more than 20 years, owner Ron Weidenbach has run a simple operation, raising tilapia in floating cages in the deep waters of an old…
Creator: Robert Yonover is a serial inventor. Although he studied volcanology at the University of Hawaii and has worked at MIT, for much of the last 30 years he’s been inventing search and rescue devices. RescueStreamer is one of his…
FSC is a small, two-year-old, Hawaii firm that works entirely in Asia, especially China. James Freeman – the “F” in FSC – talks about size, technology and what it takes to succeed abroad. There must be real challenges for a…
Sexton has been with Xerox for more than 30 years, guiding the Hawaii branch through dramatic changes in business and technology, and one of the greatest tragedies in Hawaii history: the mass murder at the Xerox warehouse in 1999. We talk with Sexton…
Kuyper was born and raised on Oahu, but, like many ambitious Hawaii youth, he was drawn by college and career to the mainland. Thirty years later, after working for blue-chip companies like the Boston Consulting Group, Wellington Management and Morgan…
“Past is prologue.” – William Shakespeare Darrell Hamamura punches his code into a keypad, pulls open the door to the vault and steps back into the past. As the land information systems manager for Kamehameha Schools, he tracks the endowment’s…
Problem: “Where did those shots come from?” Even on today’s high-tech battlefield, it’s often hard to tell. That’s why Honolulu-based Oceanit developed FLASH – Fast as Light Assessment of Snipers and Hostile Fire – which uses infrared sensors and high-speed processors.…
Hanahauoli School The first rule of not-for-profits,” writes nonprofit consultant Peter Brinckerhoff, “is mission, mission, and more mission.” Mission, he points out, is a nonprofit organization’s legal reason for existence. It’s why the staff works long hours, often for a…
Most business owners talk a good story when it comes to customer service, but, unless you are always there, you depend on employees to provide that service. Do you know how well they’re doing? A secret-shopper company can tell you.…
Subway now has more outlets than any other restaurant chain in the country and, with more than 35,000 locations in 98 countries, it’s closing in on McDonald’s worldwide lead. That growth is only possible because thousands of people are drawn…
What do you really know about your customers? Do you know their ages? Where they live? How much money they make? How many kids they have? Do you know where else they shop? How they make buying decisions? Why they…
As executive VP and GM of dck pacific construction since 2008, Roger Peters has guided the company through one of the worst building climates in memory. With few major projects (except for rail) on the horizon, we ask Peters for…
After seven years as a judge in Family Court and six years as the administrative director of the state court system, Michael Broderick talks about the challenges of running one of Hawaii’s most visible nonprofits. Michael Broderick President and…
What it's Worth? $256,928 Kamaaina Rate: $127,808 Nonresidents pay $64,232 a year for four years of medical training at the University of Hawaii’s John A. Burns School of Medicine – not including living expenses. Local students pay half that. The…
It's much the same with businesses. When they're thriving, their income statements all look alike – tidy family portraits of profits and tranquility. It's when companies fail that all their neuroses and idiosyncrasies come into view. That's when you discover…
In his three years as CEO of Aloha Petroleum, Richard Parry has helped the company diversify its business. Last year, it purchased the Hawaii assets of Shell Oil. It also has gradually expanded its interests in alternative fuels. We talked to…
There are a lot of reasons we visit our local coffeehouse: client meetings, free Wi-Fi or just the routine caffeine fix. For these purposes, your franchise coffee shop, with its roaring espresso machine and big Bunn brewers, works just fine.…
In November 2009, in the difficult aftermath of the Great Recession, Matthew Bittick left a cozy position as principal broker and sales manager at the Hawaii office of PM Realty Groupto strike out on his own. Now, as his new company, Bishop…
A look at the policy decisions, external crises and social changes that gave Hawai‘i the most expensive housing in the nation.
Find out who led the way in 14 categories, and how two organizations attract and keep employees despite serious challenges.
