Robolink was established in San Diego, California, to encourage students to engage with and enjoy STEM. We make fun and approachable robotics kits that bring computer science to life and teach real industry competency. We teach programming and artificial intelligence through our robots and ship kits all over the world.
When Robolink was founded in 2012, STEM education was becoming more important. President Obama had recently started the White House Science Fair and code.org was one year away from launching its Hour of Code challenge. However, UCSD alum and CEO Hansol Hong didn’t see any exciting or engaging STEM products that delivered thorough and well-thought-out educational materials. Robolink’s first robotics kit prototype, Rokit Smart, was developed, and instructors started teaching K-12 students in the company’s Sorrento Valley office in order to make STEM education more accessible and fun.
In the past seven years, Robolink has grown. They have taken advantage of the extraordinary engineering talent coming out of local universities like UCSD and SDSU to add more team members. Another local learning center has been added, and Robolink has benefited from the ecosystems surrounding hardware, startups, and STEM education in San Diego. Two more products have joined Robolink’s lineup, and this is where the company thrives; they have been at the forefront of developing cutting-edge educational hardware since their inception. CoDrone, which was developed in 2016, was the company’s answer to the growing popularity of consumer drones and is the world’s first programmable drone for education. It was a Last Gadget Standing Finalist the same year. Zumi, a self driving car kit, was designed to teach kids about artificial intelligence and autonomous transportation and won the 2019 CES Best of Innovation Award for Robotics. Robolink has shipped thousands of these kits, some as close as ten minutes away from their office and some as far away as Australia and New Zealand.
Striking a balance between delivering industry-aligned education and engaging students with products can be difficult. Robolink develops multiple iterations of their robotics kits with user tests at their learning centers as well as with local schools that are happy to invite local companies to their computer science classes or after-school robotics clubs. This works well for everyone involved: parents and teachers are happy with the educational value, and students are happy because they have fun with robots.
Robolink’s mission is to make STEM education accessible, engaging, and fun for all. Students all over the world can learn how to build and program robots with online lessons that come with United States standards–aligned lesson plans for teachers that want to use Robolink’s kits in their classrooms. By doing this, Robolink hopes to cultivate the next generation of innovators and inventors and build their passion for science, engineering, and coding.
