Second-year middle school student Ayumu Kato (加藤 歩夢) won 3 awards, including the Minister of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology Award, for his monitoring pedometer, taking the top prize for the second consecutive year. The competition was held in Shibuya, Tokyo, on 20 September 2026.
The Creative Robotics Contest 2026, organised by the education group RISE, was held in Shibuya, Tokyo, with 25 participants from across Japan. Participants demonstrated their learning through live presentations and runs of self-built robots, competing in the Theme Exploration and Time Attack Race categories.
Second-year middle school student Ayumu Kato (加藤 歩夢) won 3 awards for his “monitoring pedometer”: the Minister of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology Award, the Digital Innovation Award and the gold award in the Theme Exploration category. He developed a system supporting exercise habits among older people and monitoring by their families, incorporating a 3D-printed exterior design, LINE notifications, photo sharing and a voice alarm.
In the Time Attack Race category, Yuma Kato (加藤 優真) won gold. After reducing the robot’s weight and improving its autonomous driving performance, he recorded 9.43 seconds on his second run. He took the top spot in the category, improving on his silver award the previous year.
The contest theme was “Making Japan’s future better with robots.” There were 7 participants in the Theme Exploration category and 18 in the Time Attack Race category. Takayuki Furuta (古田 貴之) served as chair of the judging panel, which evaluated the designs, consideration for users and attention to detail of the entries.