calender_icon.png 1 October, 2026 | 9:40 PM

Student Innovators advance their robotic projects at World Robot Olympiad Entrepreneur Program

01-10-2026 09:08:40 PM

Hyderabad, India: Twenty teams from 13 countries pitched their robotics ideas to entrepreneurs, investors, and industry leaders at the World Robot Olympiad™ (WRO®) STEM Entrepreneur Program. The competition allows teams to experience what they might face if launching a real startup.

Four teams from 13 countries received project funding and six-month mentoring after impressing the judges with both technical quality and their ability to communicate why their ideas have commercial potential in solving real-world challenges.The WRO STEM Entrepreneur Program, powered by Aramco, is a new initiative to bridge the gap between STEM education and entrepreneurship by giving students the opportunity to defend how their technologies work, why they matter, and how they would take their solutions from the competition arena to the market.

The winning teams were recognized for combining technical innovation with entrepreneurship – balancing engineering, communication, and commercial thinking while addressing a real-world challenge through their projects.

Project CARED, Philippines – An integrated patient-monitoring system designed to automate routine measurements and reduce repetitive work for nurses.

Mini-Ibot Innovators, Italy – A tactile art tablet that enables blind and visually impaired people to create and experience art through touch and sound.

Navrachana Vidyani, India – A robotic firefighting system designed to detect and respond to fires while reducing the need for people to enter hazardous environments.

Why Combinator, South Korea – A sensor-glove system designed to turn everyday human interactions into training data for robots and Physical AI.

Each team will receive a $5,000 award, along with six months of mentoring from industry experts, including investment professionals from Aramco Ventures and the India STEM Foundation, to help further develop their projects. Hadeel Al-Eisa, Aramco Corporate Citizenship Manager, said: ”At Aramco, we believe the future lies in empowering young people. Our STEM Education Global Program enables students to understand science and technology and use it to create, build, and solve. Our strategic partnership with WRO continues to expand, allowing students to take their ideas outside of the classroom, from ideation and prototyping to execution and growth.”