Codeybot is a cute little robot that teaches kids to code. Oh, and it shoots lasers.

A bunch of makers and tinkerers from the global capital of hardware, China’s Shenzhen, are back on Kickstarter with their fourth crowdfunding campaign.

The startup, called Makeblock, is headed by CEO Jasen Wang. The team behind him is no rag-tag band of geeks with soldering irons – they form an experienced and well-funded startup that has the backing of Sequoia Capital and has grown to 160 employees.

Jasen’s newest gadget is Codeybot, a toy robot that teaches kids how to code.

He admits that he didn’t learn to code until he was an undergraduate. “But I’ve been captivated by it since I started learning.”

“I think coding is a useful path to creation, for children especially,” Jasen adds. “In this information age, coding became a useful and important method – children can make their ideas come true by coding. Moreover, learning coding could cultivate children’s logical thinking abilities and enhance their problem-solving abilities.”

You can get it to play music over wifi – and then dance to the music.

The self-balancing Codeybot costs upwards of US$99 on Kickstarter. The educational robot works with two apps – the Codeybot app is used to design colorful LED “faces,” control it remotely, and take part in a “battle mode” if you have two of the cute gizmos. The open-source mBlockly app is where users can learn coding by programming the little bot to do specific actions in sequence.

While the toy is not too pricey, you’ll need an iPhone or iPad for the accompanying Codeybot app – and the mBlockly app is limited to the iPad only, probably because you need a big screen to program all those sequences using its simple drag-and-drop interface.

The open-source mBlockly app works with a variety of programmable toys and robots – including the Codeybot.

The Codeybot has a few other fun tricks – it’ll take your voice commands, you can get it to play music over wifi, dance to music, make silly voices, and even shoots lasers. You’ll need the laser add-on for that last bit, as well as for the battle mode.

Building blocks

Codeybot has already soared past its US$100,000 funding goal, with more than 800 backers paying around US$137,000 – and it still has more than a month to go on Kickstarter. The toy should arrive with buyers in August.