Yee Jia Chen - App Development

Jia Chen has always been fascinated by the intersection of science and technology. As a child growing up in Singapore, his family encouraged him to play STEM-based games. And with his first iPhone, his passion for technology exploded.

“When I was 11 years old, my entire world was transformed by the incredible capabilities of mobile apps.”

That was all the inspiration Jia Chen needed to bring his own ideas to life, through apps. He learned to code using Swift on Mac — just two years later, he developed and published his first iOS app to the App Store.

Today, Jia Chen’s life revolves around building solutions with the technology he loves. He studies advanced user experience design, end-to-end development, and entrepreneurship at Ngee Ann Polytechnic. For his projects, he uses iPad to sketch app designs in Freeform and ideates with Swift Playgrounds before jumping on Mac to develop with Xcode.

Jia Chen also enjoys coming up with ideas that make learning more engaging. As an intern at the Apple Developer Academy in Indonesia, he coded a 3D-style presentation to help mentor and inspire other developers to use ARKit. And his volunteer work, teaching autistic students at a local school, inspired him to develop the “ExploreAbility” app which shows how to integrate Apple accessibility features, like VoiceOver and Guided Access, into apps.

“I love sharing knowledge,” Jia Chen says. “I aim to ensure that learning app development is accessible to everyone in a positive and collaborative environment.”

To add to his portfolio, Jia Chen also developed for Swiss sewing company Bernina. The “Bianco” app allows designers to create patterns with Apple Pencil on iPad. They then use the app’s AR functionality — powered by ARKit and iPad camera system — to preview how it will look on fabric.

And he’s only getting started. At just 18 years old, Jia Chen has already published six apps on the App Store, and is a two-time Swift Student Challenge winner. He continues to develop iOS apps and inspire young minds to create and explore.

“Coding and building apps with Swift is the perfect avenue to bring ideas to life. Coming up with an idea, quickly prototyping, and testing it out is all the superpower I need.”