A former Navy Seabee inspired by helping disabled veterans successfully defended his AI-powered literacy app for kids Monday night, claiming a $50,000 grand prize in a live event in Philadelphia.
Michael Hyacinthe, 45, was the 11th annual winner of Veteran Shark Tank, a veteran-founded event — held in conjunction with Army-Navy Week — intended to support and raise awareness about veteran entrepreneurs.
Hyacinthe, the founder of a tech-driven creative company called Wimage, presented a feature that will use AI to read story books to children. He beat out four other finalist teams, including Marine Corps and Army vets who presented a one-handed gaming controller and an Army veteran who designs “military-grade” socks for athletes and service members.
Wimage was inspired, Hyacinthe said, by his encounter with a veteran who’d lost both hands and wanted a practical way to continue to create art. Hyacinthe, who’d already co-founded a nonprofit, Has Heart, which paired veterans with artists, developed an AI program that would convert the spoken word into imagery, founding his company in 2016.
“Before [generative] AI was really sexy, we saw the power of allowing a person who did not have the [physical] capacity to create to feel as if they were creative,” he told Military Times in an interview.
From there Hyacinthe ventured into children’s programming, designing a character called Wimee the Robot that would eventually anchor a PBS show called Wimee’s Words.
“We saw an opportunity to take the app as it was to connect with kids, because teachers were like, ‘Wow, a child with speech problems, or just even a child learning to read, can say the word ‘dog’ and instantly see that dog,’” Hyacinthe said.
The finalists on Veteran Shark Tank had to beat out more than 70 applicants in a rigorous selection process to appear at the event, said Alex Archawski, founder of the Greater Philadelphia Veterans Network and co-founder of Veteran Shark Tank.
The judging panel included Patrick Murphy, former under secretary of the Army, and four successful veteran entrepreneurs, including 2023 winner Shante Frazier, an Army National Guard vet.
The event began small in 2012, Archawski said, but grew over the years to attract applicants from all over the country. A few years in, organizers aligned the event with the Army-Navy football game, which, while it will be played in Washington, D.C., this year, has also been held in Philadelphia.
“We make it the first economic event of that week to inspire and motivate our population,” he said. “We’re not just trying to help veteran entrepreneurs to believe in who they are. It’s also about putting the right people in the room to be inspired to do more with veterans.”
In addition to a useful grilling by the judging panel on business plans and productivity and the promise of $50,000 in seed money for the winner, finalists also get a personalized tour of Philadelphia and a VIP visit to a previous winner the day after the competition.
The event itself, which is not televised or streamed in order to maintain its exclusivity, also reserves blocks of tickets for transitioning veterans and student-veterans who aspire to entrepreneurship.
“A lot of them may not believe they deserve to be on stage, because of their humble background,” Archawski said, “but we want to give them the opportunity to see this.”
For Hyacinthe, a Bronx native who drove a New York City yellow cab for two years after getting out of the Navy in 2005 and at times had to sleep in his cab at night, winning the competition against a formidable slate of challengers left him “ecstatic and relieved.”
The prize money, he said, will fund investment in social media marketing and the launch of a child’s digital companion that will read books to kids in real time and also answer questions about the story. That’s set to launch in the next four to six months, he said.
To would-be Veteran Shark Tank competitors, Hyacinthe recommended taking risks and being unafraid to fail in striving for success.
“The ability to recognize your vulnerability and put yourself out there is a tool that is very valuable,” he said. “Recognize when to be vulnerable and commit to putting yourself out there and sharing your journey and your mission with the world.”
