Every day since freshman year, Ben Hazlett and one of his current closest friends, Adam Justice, sat in the back of the band classroom drowning out their teacher’s lecture by playing “Counter-Strike: Global Offensive” on their MacBooks.
As their friendship continued, Justice taught Hazlett how to build a PC so they could take their gaming to a new level. That moment of putting together the bits and pieces of a computer is what led him to major in computer science at Kansas State University this fall, with hopes of starting a tech company that focuses on smart home electronics.
For the past four years, robotics teacher Vincent Miller’s seventh hour class, along with robotics club, has been a place Hazlett could go to work on his passion.
“You meet a lot of like-minded people and some of the projects I did, I’ve put on my college applications,” Hazlett said.
Hazlett landed on Kansas State’s program after attending the Hack K-State event his sophomore year. The on-campus annual event features groups of three to ten high school students who learn software and hardware skills and are tasked to create a project in 48 hours.
In the fall, Hazlett plans to focus on researching and developing different types of smart home products.
“I’ve got a couple ideas but one of them, which I’ve only seen done on smaller scales, is a smart system sprinkler system,” Hazlett said. “Something that is linked through your phone or [Amazon] Alexa where you can just tap a button no matter where you are.”
He hopes to familiarize himself with these products so he can start his own tech company in the Midwest by the time he enters post-education. According to Hazlett, companies are just now starting to dip their toes in the smart home electronic industry, with things like Roomba’s — autonomous robotic vacuum — being built into Alexa’s.
“I’m a firm believer that it’s only a matter of time before we will run everything from your lawn mower to your windows to your thermostat,” Hazlett said. “Once there is a secure network for [smart home technology], I think it will explode so I want to capitalize on that.”
While Hazlett’s dream of his own tech company won’t be acted upon until post college, he can definitely see himself in a place like Kansas City or St. Louis where smart home technology could be used in housing developments — or “ideally on a yacht somewhere in the Carribean.”