Competitors for international robotics competition announced

More than 20 student teams from leading universities across Australia and New Zealand will demonstrate their engineering and mechatronics skills on an international platform in the 2013 National Instruments Autonomous Robotics Competition (NI ARC).

The teams are tasked with building an autonomous robot in preparation for the live competition final in September, themed ‘Gold Rush’. In the final, each robot will have to navigate an obstacle-filled course, and identify, pick up and move objects to designated locations in the shortest possible time.

The 2012 teams and their robots.

Matej Krajnc, Managing Director for National Instruments Oceania, said the competition allows students to demonstrate their engineering skills and broaden their career pathways.

“With over 20 teams from 18 different universities, we are delighted to see not only a number of universities return for a second and third year but also a number of first-time entrants, including Manukau Institute of Technology, University of Adelaide, University of Sydney, University of Western Sydney and La Trobe University.

“The competition is an exciting platform for engineering students to showcase their creative and technical skills as they delve into the world of robotics and for universities to build their position in this rapidly developing space,” said Krajnc.

Participating teams will receive a development kit featuring an NI Single-Board RIO board-level reconfigurable control system and NI LabVIEW system design software featuring the LabVIEW Robotics Module. 

All teams are required to successfully achieve four milestone tasks throughout the competition under the guidance of academic supervisors and support of NI engineers.

The winner of the NI Autonomous Robotics Competition will receive a cash prize of $3000, with $1500 for the runner-up and a bonus prize of $500 for the best robot design. All teams that successfully complete the competition tasks get to keep the development kit, valued at over $20,000.

In 2012, Swinburne University of Technology’s SUAVE team won the competition with their robot, Frogstar.

Universities competing in the competition include:

• NSW: University of Newcastle, University of New South Wales, University of Technology Sydney, University of Wollongong, University of Sydney, University of Western Sydney
• WA: Curtin University
• Queensland: Griffith University, Queensland University of Technology
• Northern Territory: Charles Darwin University
• Victoria: Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology, Swinburne University of Technology, La Trobe University
• South Australia: University of Adelaide, Flinders University
• New Zealand: Manukau Institute of Technology, University of Auckland, Victoria University of Wellington