Viam expands robotics education partnership with NYC FIRST to reach 12,000 students

Nov 12, 2026
Students and teachers will work with Viam's robotics software at its New York lab and at NYC FIRST's eight STEM centers.

Robotics software company Viam is expanding its partnership with NYC FIRST, a nonprofit that runs STEM and robotics education in New York City, according to a press release. The aim is to bring hands-on robotics and physical AI lessons to more than 12,000 students.

Students will be able to work with robots at Viam's New York robotics lab and at NYC FIRST's network of eight STEM centers. In October, nearly 20 NYC FIRST educators attended a hackathon workshop at Viam where they used its software to program robotic arms to pick up and stack objects.

"Robotics is often seen as a field that requires highly-technical expertise just to get started and build," said Shannon Bradshaw, Viam's senior vice president of product and education. Viam, founded by MongoDB co-founder Eliot Horowitz, sells a software layer for building and running fleets of robots and other hardware. The release does not give funding figures or a timeline.

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