Norwegian startup No Isolation has decided that being unwell or housebound doesn’t mean kids should miss out on school. To keep everyone included (and up-to-date on their A-Zs), they dreamed up AV1 – a robot sidekick that acts as your eyes, ears, voice and hands when you can’t be there. A pretty accurate representation of a student, AV1 doesn’t sit still. It can signal to the class when you’d like to raise your hand, rotate 360° to view the entire group, and even communicate in whisper mode so hushed messages are out of the teacher’s earshot.

It might be designed for school kids but AV1 can connect anyone who is feeling isolated – a colleague working remotely, a relative who’s temporarily relocated, or your grandma whenever, because who sees their grandparents enough? Senior citizens are the next phase in No Isolation’s quest to end social estrangement – and we can’t wait to see their digital nanna hangouts take the world by storm.