Primary school duo head to global robotics competition with robot ‘buddy’ that monitors screen time

SINGAPORE – As avid Lego builders, primary school pupils Skylar Chua and Elon Chan found that reading building instructions online was straining their eyes.

On top of this, the next-door neighbours were used to seeing their friends scrolling endlessly on their phones for hours.

To tackle this screen-time problem, the duo put their minds together and spent most of their Sundays for the past year building RoboBuddies – a multipurpose robot that can help sort toys and also promote healthier screen-time habits.

“We heard Prime Minister Lawrence Wong talk about this issue during the National Day Rally, and saw that a recent survey showed that parents are concerned about their children having too much screen time,” nine-year-old Elon said.

“That gave us the confidence to know that we were solving a real problem.”

Made up of more than 50 Lego parts, a camera, 3D-printed materials, wires and wheels, RoboBuddies is designed to hold phones and move back and forth to help users keep a safe viewing distance from their screen.

It measures the distance to the user and moves backwards automatically if it senses that the user’s head has moved forward.

Based on the designated screen-time limit set by the user, RoboBuddies will also turn away and give a voice-enabled reminder to take a break to maintain eye health, 11-year-old Skylar said.

Armed with their friendly robot companion, the Singaporean duo will be among 594 teams from more than 90 countries competing in the finals of the World Robot Olympiad, taking place from Nov 26 to 28.

The global competition brings together children and youth aged eight to 22 to tackle real-world challenges through creative robotic solutions.

The 2025 finals will be held at the Sands Expo and Convention Centre, marking the return of the competition to Singapore 21 years after the first edition was held here.

Mr Brennan Tan of the Space Faculty, organiser of the 2025 finals in Singapore, said: “Singapore has always been a vibrant city... where innovation is at the forefront, and where the brightest and most hard-working talent can converge.”

The company supports space experiments and satellite building.

Of the organiser’s chosen competition theme for 2025 – The Future of Robots – he said: “This is a celebration, not just of robotics, but a challenge where youth will have to solve the problems and challenges of the day.”

He added: “They will be forced to look into the future and see how they can impact future robots and how robots will impact the future of how we live.”

The RoboBuddies team will be up against contestants from across the globe in the Elementary Future Innovators category, which is meant for eight- to 12-year-olds.

Two other teams from Singapore are also gearing up to compete in the finals next week.

Teams in the Future Engineers category have been tasked with building the best possible mini-autonomous vehicle that can avoid obstacles and parallel park in a 3m by 3m field.

“One of the biggest challenges was developing a steering mechanism that can allow the vehicle to navigate smoothly,” said 14-year-old Joshua Yam, whose team Galaxy Raiders includes two other Secondary 2 students.

He added that two wheels turning at the same angle meant a rougher drive.

Taking inspiration from go-karts, the team employed the Ackermann steering configuration, which allowed the inner wheels to turn at a sharper angle than the outer ones.

This also helps smoothen the parallel parking process, Joshua said.

The Tribal Research Development team, which is competing in the senior RoboMission category, has built a robot that can pick up, stack and arrange Lego parts in specific locations, simulating the process of assembling a spaceship.

Polytechnic student Calvin Lee, 18, spent eight to 10 hours daily working on the robot during his recent term break, together with his schoolmate Nicholas Cheok, 17, and junior college student Choong Hayn Nie, 17.

The team believes its strongest competitors might be from Malaysia, Taiwan and Switzerland.

“We will not underestimate them,” said Calvin. “In fact, we look forward to meeting them, because this is not just about competition – it’s about interacting and sharing our knowledge.”