Nigerian Engineer’s Robot Braids Hair Five Times Faster

A Nigerian-born biomechanical engineer has created what is being described as the world’s first automated braid-assist device, a machine that can complete individual braids up to five times faster than a stylist working by hand while leaving the creative control firmly in the professional’s hands.

Yinka Ogunbiyi, a Harvard-trained engineer and entrepreneur, developed HaloBraid after years of personal frustration with the time and physical toll of protective styling. The device is designed to support professional hairstylists rather than replace them. A stylist still sections the hair, applies products, decides the size and pattern of each braid, and starts the plait by hand. The braid is then fed into the machine, which performs the repetitive mid-length weaving. The stylist returns to finish, trim and seal the ends.

Ogunbiyi has said the idea grew from a lifetime of sitting in the braid chair and from a particularly trying experience during the COVID-19 lockdown. Unable to visit a salon, she spent four full days installing her own knotless braids. That ordeal, combined with conversations with stylists and clients about long appointments and repetitive strain injuries, convinced her that the process needed engineering solutions.

“My braid story starts at age four, sitting between my mum’s legs as she braided my hair for the first time,” she has recalled. “Since then, I’ve spent thousands of hours getting my hair braided — and heard the same story from stylists and clients again and again: braiding is beautiful, but it takes too much time and too much strain.”

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Working with co-founder David Afolabi, also a Harvard graduate, Ogunbiyi’s team surveyed more than 2,200 people who wear braids, interviewed about 200 stylists, and built more than 600 prototypes. The project won the grand prize at Harvard’s 2025 President’s Innovation Challenge, securing $75,000 in non-dilutive funding. In 2026 the company raised $7 million in a seed round led by Seven Seven Six, the venture firm founded by Reddit co-founder Alexis Ohanian, with participation from AlleyCorp and Bling Capital.

The company reports strong commercial interest, with more than 7,000 professional salons already on a waiting list. Celebrity hairstylist Vernon François has joined as Creative Engineer to help refine the technology from a stylist’s perspective. HaloBraid is designed primarily for box braids and knotless braids across a range of sizes; it does not perform close-to-the-scalp cornrows or fully autonomous styling.

Company research points to the scale of the problem the device seeks to address: an estimated eight billion hours are spent in braiding chairs each year, predominantly by Black women. A single appointment can last six to eight hours or longer, limiting how many clients a stylist can serve and contributing to physical issues such as carpal tunnel syndrome, arthritis and back pain. By accelerating the most repetitive part of the process, HaloBraid aims to shorten overall appointment times substantially, ease the physical burden on braiders, and allow salons to serve more clients without sacrificing quality or the stylist’s artistry.

Recent demonstrations shared by the company show the device in action. HaloBraid is moving toward commercial availability in select professional salons, with a phased rollout planned. Pricing details have not been publicly confirmed, though the company has indicated stylists will not be required to buy the equipment outright.

Ogunbiyi, who previously worked on smart consumer appliances, has framed the invention as both a technical and cultural intervention: technology applied to a practice that has changed little for thousands of years, created by and for the communities that rely on it most.