Announcing the Autonomous Robot Challenge

We’ve teamed up with Arm on a new challenge focused on autonomous machines that push the limits of what low-cost, open-source hardware, and deep learning on the edge can do for humanity.

We are excited by the potential of drones (flying, rolling, and swimming) to help us in our daily lives, delivering food and medicines to those in need, assisting in agriculture, responding to emergencies, and much more. As a result, we want to see what you, our incredible community, can dream up using advanced hardware kits, sensors, computer vision, and deep learning based on Arm.

For this contest, we want you to design the next innovative machine using your choice of some of Arm’s favorite technologies:

• A Raspberry Pi-controlled Donkey Car

• Any Arm-based board, including Raspberry Pi, 96Boards, Teensy, and BeagleBone Black, to name just a few.

• OpenMV or JeVois Camera modules

• Pixhawk 4 flightcontroller

• A drone, rover,underwater ROV, or vehicle of your own making

Early applicants will be eligible to receive one of 50 Donkey Cars that Arm has provided Hackster, which we will be distributed to entrants who submit compelling proposals around how these small wheeled robots can be used for good. We are also inviting developers to use drones, rovers, and underwater ROVs of their own creation.

In order to be considered for the contest, your machine needs to be able to achieve at least one of the following tasks: autonomously transport a package in an urban, rural or underwater environment, or autonomously assist in a real-world scenario.

We envision a world in which drones of various kinds work alongisde humans and help address some of the world’s greatest challenges. What do you imagine? Bonus points will be given for actual use cases in your local environment.

We are giving away thousands of dollars to 10 lucky grand prize winners in the form of robotic devices including an X PlusOne HD Pro, a Robugtix T8X, an OpenROV Trident, a Onewheel+, and more. (Our judges at Arm are going to pick the best qualifying projects based on the judging criteria outlined in the rules section.) You also have a chance to take home a GoPro HERO 6 if you post a fun and entertaining video on social media with the hashtag #ArmRobotChallenge!

But that’s not all — we have a few bonus challenges (for extra points during judging!) for you to consider as well!

AI on the Edge

• Does your machine use the latest frameworks released by Arm to enable deep learning on Arm processors?

• Does it make the best use of the MCUs on board?

Sustainability

• Does your solution help people to live more healthy, sustainable and peaceful lives?

• Does your drone take advantage of renewable energies? Does it park in the sun to recharge?

• Does your solution help to conserve energy?

Mapping

• Is it able to create a map of an unknown environment and use it to navigate?

• Mapping disaster zones to help first aid / deliver supplies — maybe your Donkey Car delivers emergency supplies, or your homemade drone maps lava flows to identify open escape routes?

All submissions should make use of autonomous vehicle or drone technology based on Arm and follow the theme of this contest (autonomous bots). You can find more details and submit your project on our official page here.