Gen Z Harvard dropout builds AI platform for architects

In the past few years, breaking the various flavors of AI models out of their silos and teaching them to work together has been a job mostly for the enterprise giants.

Aurora Zelia I Sam Hui is among the first wave of smaller entrepreneurs outside the AI industry to launch a company that combines artificial intelligence and robotics into a working venture. BIM Engine – the company Zelia co-founded in 2025 – is already profitable and has been involved in more than 80 projects to date.

Image credit: Arsal Ysfin

An AI agent platform for the architecture, engineering, and construction (AEC) industry, BIM Engine is based in San Francisco’s SoMa district. The global AEC market was valued at US$12.2 billion in 2025 and is expected to grow to around US$26.8 billion by 2033, according to Skyquest.

BIM Engine uses several models, which it calls engines. Its Inspection and Husky engines use robots to conduct site inspections and deliver materials to construction workers. The Reconstruction engine compiles the data into 3D models. Its Material Engine uses agentic AI to automate procurement for construction materials.

To Zelia, who began building robots when she was 10 years old, the convergence of these technologies is not incidental.

“I think it started from my robotics roots because I’ve always been technical. Building robots teaches you a lot of things, such as how to use technology to solve physical problems,” she tells Tech in Asia.

She regards AI as “just a tool to solve those problems.”

See also: The startups turning Southeast Asia’s AI hype into working agents

But the twist here is that her success is not because of her long experience working with robots, architecture, or AI. Zelia, who dropped out of Harvard University during her fourth year, is only 23 years old but already has a decade’s worth of work experience.

At 13, she was competing at the First Tech Challenge with a 10-person team. At 15, she was one of the winners of The Next BMW Designer 2018 competition, and the automaker flew her to Munich, Germany, to train in industrial design.

While still in high school, Zelia had to choose between pharmaceutical research and architecture. She finished high school two years early at 17 to take a job at an architecture firm.

When asked whether her age and gender have been obstacles in the industry, Zelia’s answer is brief:

“So far? Not yet.”

Working together

Building the AI

Raising capital