Meet Silas Adekunle, world’s highest-paid robotics engineer
Let’s talk about Silas Adekunle, a brilliant Nigerian inventor and entrepreneur who made waves by creating the world’s first intelligent gaming robot.
Born in Nigeria, Silas moved to the UK at 12 and went on to earn a first-class robotics degree and an honorary Doctor of Technology degree from the University of the West of England, Bristol.
Silas co-founded and led Reach Robotics, a UK-based company that combined augmented reality gaming with STEM education. The star of the company’s creation was MekaMon—a four-legged robot with lifelike movements. It wasn’t just a toy; MekaMon brought video games to life with robotics and augmented reality. Alongside the robot, Reach Robotics developed an app that controlled MekaMon and served as a gateway to even more digital fun.
Silas raised $12 million in investments, growing the company to about 65 employees at its peak. In 2018, he landed a major deal with Apple to sell MekaMon in the U.S. and UK.
Adekunle is regarded as the highest paid in the field of robotic engineering, after being credited for building the world’s first gaming robot. Adekunle was able to achieve this feat after signing a mouth-watering deal with Apple Inc.
Despite these achievements, Reach Robotics faced challenges in the consumer robotics industry and closed its doors in September 2019. Later in 2022, the name “Reach Robotics” was revived by a company called Blueprint Lab.
But Silas Adekunle didn’t stop there. He turned his focus to robotics education across Africa, using MekaMon to inspire the next generation of tech innovators. He also started Awarri, a company promoting AI and robotics technology on the continent. By January 2020, he became the co-founder and CEO of R.I., a company helping developers create cloud solutions to remotely manage robots, industrial systems, and IoT devices.
Silas’s work has earned him well-deserved global recognition. In 2018, he was named one of the Financial Times’ “Top 100 Minority Ethnic Leaders in Technology” and featured on Forbes’ 30 Under 30 Europe: Technology list.
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