GUARDIAN

As the number of frail older adults living at home grows, the professional care workforce is shrinking. GUARDIAN introduced MAATJE — ‘buddy’ in Dutch — a social robot companion providing daily structure through medication reminders, eating and drinking prompts and appointment notifications in natural, adapted dialogue.

Onboard sensors continuously monitor the senior’s wellbeing, enabling proactive reporting to caregivers through mobile and web applications. Remote caregivers can instruct the robot to relay messages, initiate dialogues or open a live audio-video connection. A key innovation was the robot’s capacity to remember past interactions and adapt to the individual over time.

The project was piloted over three years in the Netherlands, Italy and Switzerland with all three user groups, structured around co-creation, ethical and value-sensitive design, and business modelling.