Daiki Maekawa
Robotics Engineer at SEQSENSE
Summary
I'm a robotics enthusiast who desires to contribute to the development of challenging products.
While gathering technical knowledge, as a team leader, I took leadership crossing different types of field robotics projects at university. Among the many achievements I made at that time, I am most proud that I led my team to become the world champion at the autonomous robot competition named RoboCup.
After graduating, I deepened my skills in robotics while working in Switzerland and Japan for a multinational company.
Now I'm working on the optimization of the autonomous security robot at its mass production stage.Opensource contribution can be found @ https://github.com/DaikiMaekawa
What's RoboCup?
RoboCup is an annual international robotics competition founded in 1997.
The aim is to promote robotics and AI research, by offering a publicly appealing, but formidable challenge.
The official goal of the project:
"By the middle of the 21st century, a team of fully autonomous humanoid robot soccer players shall win a soccer game, complying with the official rules of FIFA, against the winner of the most recent World Cup.
Experience
Robot Navigation Engineer
Rapyuta Robotics - Full-time
Mar 2015 - Sep 2018 (3 years 7 months)
Zurich, Switzerland and Tokyo, Japan
I joined the company at a quite early stage thus I was involved in the development of various types of systems and architecture as our business expanded.
What I mainly worked on are:
# Indoor security robots- The UAV's dynamic obstacle avoidance based on Artificial Potential Field generated by point clouds.
- Integration of the measurement sensors into our navigation system, due to this, I also experimented with the sensors and then worked on their software drivers.
- The landmark-based 3DoF pose estimator for the differential drive robot.
- The planer navigation system that included the mapping dedicated to the Ackermann steering car.
- The instruction GUI allowing for control of certain points that have to be traversed.
Development environment: FreeRTOS, OpenEmbedded, Linux, Git, C++11, Python, CMake, ROS, PCL, Qt, JTAG, GDB
# Outdoor drone- Integration of the embedded radio communication device to the outdoor drone.
- The path planners which enable the robot to avoid no-fly zones or automatically create coverage path in a region of interest.
- The cloud's backend system that connects the drone and the user requests coming from the browser UI.
Development environment: FreeRTOS, OpenEmbedded, Linux, Git, C++11, Python, CMake, ROS, CGAL, Django, RESTful API, GRPC, PostgreSQL, JTAG, GDB
# Logistics cooperative robots
This project was different from the other projects I served ever. To launch a new project completely from scratch, I worked together with the business team for market research and then led the product development. I developed the navigation system as well as the user interface for the multi-agent system that solves the optimization problem in a combination of human and mobile robots.Development environment: Linux, Git, C++11, Python, CMake, ROS, Qt, JTAG, GDB
Project Leader
April 2014 - April 2015 (1 year 1 month)
I led the team members and developed the mobile robot that solved the task given by the field robotics competition named Tsukuba Challenge. In the challenge, our robot traveled 1.43 km in an outdoor environment.
Development environment: Linux, C++, Python, Git, CMake, ROS, OpenCV, Bash, GDB
Open Source is available here. https://github.com/open-rdc/orne_navigation
Robotics Event Organizer
April 2014 – March 2015
I launched the Japanese roboticist organization that holds meetup events regularly and made it around 100 people scale. Moreover, I managed the collaboration with a couple of companies to make sure that we enjoy the content at the events.
Team Leader
CITBrains
January 2013 – March 2015 (2 years 3 months)I steered the RoboCup team that developed fully autonomous soccer robots in the Humanoid League.
I contributed a lot to the development of navigation, autonomous cooperative decision making as well as various types of base infrastructures like communication, simulation compatible with the real robot, Linux migration, debugging tools, and so on.
Development environment: Linux, C++, Python, Git, CMake, OpenCV, Qt, SWIG, V-REP, ZeroC Ice, GDBParttime Software Developer
Tokyo Opensource Robotics Kyokai
December 2014 - December 2014 (1 month)
I helped the development of the manipulator robot called Nextage.
Development environment: Linux, C++, Python, ROS, GDB
Research and Development Engineer
ESK Inc - Part-time
November 2013 – August 2014 (10 month)
I developed and successfully delivered the meter automatic reading system for agricultural use.
Development environment: Linux, C++, CMake, GDB, OpenCV
Project Leader
Chiba Institute of Technology
May 2011 – April 2013 (2 years)I developed an educational embedded board.
The functionalities are:
- DC motors control
- Send serial messages through XBee
- Print arbitrary text messages on LCD
- AD converter for three different sensors
- Control Servo motor's angle
- IMU support through I2C interface
Open Source is available here. https://github.com/DaikiMaekawa/RoboticsProjectSoftware Developer
April 2011 - January 2013 (1 year 10 months)
I developed 90 cm tall humanoid robots that can autonomously and cooperatively play soccer.
Development environment: Windows, C++, Python, CMake, OpenCVCITBrains
CITBrains is the Robocup team that developed the fully autonomous humanoid soccer robots.
To put it simply, my four-year journey to become the world champion was not easy.
I decided to become the leader when the team was about to give up. Almost all members have graduated so only two developers remained. At that time, unfortunately, most of the technical knowledge was not documented well which put us in a difficult situation.
Even under such harsh conditions, my urge to become the world champion was not shaken at all. In short, I had to reorganize both the robot system as well as the team nearly from scratch.I expanded the team size to around 40 within a year by making the team more compatible with the academics and therefore making it easier for the team members to focus on the project as well as their grades.
Furthermore, we developed a new generation of the robot within two years that successfully enhanced its reliability and intelligence.We achieved this by convincing sponsors and increasing our budget to about 200k USD.
Honors and Awards
Chiba Prefecture Governor Prize
Chiba Prefecture Governor
May 2015
Contributed significantly to the industry and accomplished excellent research.
Chairman of the Board's Award
May 2015
The highest Award in Chiba Institute of Technology.
Award for the person who accomplished tremendous achievements for the Chiba Institute of Technology.
Department Chair Award
May 2015
Excellent research results at Advanced Robotics Dept.
Louis Vuitton Best Humanoid Award, Robocup 2014, Joao Pessoa
July 2014
Award for the team that reached the top at three classes in the humanoid robot league as the highest honor in RoboCup.
Since 2002, Louis Vuitton has sponsored the “Louis Vuitton Humanoid Cup” for RoboCup, an international research and educational initiative for artificial intelligence and robotics with a focus on soccer-playing robots. The Humanoid League was added to the RoboCupSoccer event in 2002. Louis Vuitton has created a championship trophy for this program in order to, by aiming to promote development of robots capable of competing against a human team by the year 2050, encourage technological innovation.
1st Place in Humanoid League Kid Size Competition, Robocup 2014, Joao Pessoa
July 2014
As the CITBrains, we won the first place in humanoid league kid size class in Robocup 2014, Brazil, the international robot soccer competition
1st Place in Humanoid League Kid Size Technical Challenge, Robocup 2014, Joao Pessoa
July 2014
As the CITBrains, we won the first place in humanoid league kid size class in Robocup 2014, Brazil, the international robot soccer technical challenge
Best Presentation Award
The Society of Instrument and Control Engineers
December 2014
Awarded to the excellent research result.
1st Place in Humanoid League Kid Size Technical Challenge, Robocup 2013, Eindhoven
June 2013
1st Place in Humanoid League Kid Size Technical Challenge, Robocup 2012, Mexico City
June 2012
2nd Place in Humanoid League Kid Size Competition, Robocup 2012, Mexico City
June 2012
Best Presentation Award
Chiba Institute of Technology
February 2014Excellent research results at Advanced Robotics Dept.
1st Place in Humanoid League Kid Size Competition, Robocup Japan Open 2013, Tokyo
May2013
1st Place in Humanoid League Kid Size Technical Challenge, Robocup Japan Open 2013, Tokyo
May 2013
1st Place in Humanoid League Kid Size Competition, Robocup Japan Open 2012, Osaka
May 2012
1st Place in Humanoid League Kid Size Technical Challenge, Robocup Japan Open 2012, Osaka
May 2012
1st Place in Humanoid League Kid Size Competition, Robocup Japan Open 2011, Osaka
May 2011
1st Place in Humanoid League Kid Size Technical Challenge, Robocup Japan Open 2011, Osaka
May 2011
ROS JAPAN Users Group
ROS Community in Japan
As a representative, I partnered with several companies, and has held meetups with robot technicians on a regular basis.
SQ2 - An Autonomous SECURITY ROBOT
SEQSENSE offers an autonomous security platform that combines an autonomous robot, a cloud-based control interface, and deep-learning-based awareness. Our robot, SQ2, acts as a remote set of eyes and ears to existing security staff and can automatically raise alarms when certain situations are encountered.
Project ORNE
Project ORNE (ORNE for Robot Navigation Engineer) provided outdoor navigation system with i-Cart mini on ROS.
Development of outdoor autonomous mobile robot for Tsukuba Challenge.
Tsukuba Challenge Web Page: http://www.tsukubachallenge.jp/
In the challenge, our robot traveled 1.43 km autonomously.
Automatic reading system for outdoor meter
ESK and CIT developed the agricultural database named "Hataraku Nikki" and the image processing system of measuring equipment for agriculture usage.
Skills
Robotics
Navigation, Control Theory, Mechatronics, MATLAB, ROS, Embedded Software
GUI Development
Qt, Sencha Touch, rqt
Programming
C, C++, Python, Shell Scripting
MODELING
Object Oriented Design, Software Design Patterns, UML
...
CMake, SWIG, GitHub, Linux, Git, Subversion
Projects & Organizations
ROS JAPAN Users Group
Project ORNE
Development team of an autonomous mobile robot in outdoor environment
Contact Me!
Happy to hear from you!
Copyright © 2015 - 2020 Daiki Maekawa