Hyper Hippo develops Hello Kitty app

There’s a new smartphone app for the animation giant Sanrio, the developers of Hello Kitty; and it was developed in Kelowna.

The app, called hello sanrio: say hello! launched this week at the giant celebration of comic book culture, Comi-Con in San Diego.

“Comi-Con was kind of the end goal when we started talking about developing this app because it was the perfect place to test the theory,” Ryan Loerke with Hyper Hippo said.

The theory is that people who love Sanrio animation want a way to connect with one another.

The app is the first in a series of interactive forums and games that the Kelowna-based animation and tech studio Hyper Hippo was asked to develop.

“I’m a superfan,” Morgan Long, creative lead on the project said. “I have so much Hello Kitty stuff and My Melody, all the characters, this is kind of a dream job to work on these games.”

It’s a big partnership for the Okanagan tech company and another success story that is putting Kelowna on the map as a technology hub in B.C..

“I think Kelowna is definitely growing, and on a great trajectory to be like a mini Silicon Valley,” Long said.