Team of Eight Cayman Kids Heads to Vex World Robotics Competition Next Week
PRESS RELEASE
Thursday 8 May 2025
George Town, Grand Cayman —
345Robotics is delighted to announce that eight children, ages 8-12, will represent the Cayman Islands for the first time at the Vex World Robotics Competition next week, from May 12 to 14, 2025, at the Kay Bailey Hutchinson Conference Centre in Dallas, Texas.
Their participation at this major global event is the culmination of the annual VexIQ Robotics Competition, which has over one million young competitors representing more than 17,000 teams in 70+ countries. The Cayman team has designed, built and coded a sophisticated robot that plays “Rapid Relay”, a fast-paced game requiring teamwork, robotic skills and autonomous coding.
Team development and participation in Vex Worlds 2025 has been made possible with ongoing in-kind and financial support for 345Robotics from community sponsors, including fellow non-profits Enterprise Cayman and Feed Our Future, and local businesses Rubis, Mugen, and Reside Cayman.
Nick Joseph, Founder of Reside, said, “We congratulate these brilliant young minds and their inspirational pursuit of knowledge. We wish them the best next week in Dallas and we are excited for the opportunities that this experience will bring for our future.”
Mr. Joseph’s comments were echoed by Yaroslav Pshenitsyn, Founder of Mugen, who said “Mugen are excited to support this great initiative of innovation with 345Robotics. This is one of our strong commitments to invest in brilliant young minds in building for the future of the Cayman Islands. We look forward to developing this community partnership in numerous ways during 2025 and beyond.”
Charlie Kirkconnell, CEO of Cayman Enterprise City, said: “Through Enterprise Cayman we are incredibly proud to have supported 345Robotics and the Cayman Islands VexIQ robotics team this past year. We are inspired by their talent and hard work being showcased on the world stage at the Vex Robotics Competition next week. Truly this is an initiative that empowers the next generation of problem solvers and tech leaders within our community.”
345Robotics has established an ongoing collaboration and partnership with the US non-profit Robotics Education & Competition Foundation which has also been vital to supporting team development and participation in the Vex Worlds 2025 Competition.
Throughout the past year, 345Robotics team members have designed, built, tested and coded their own robots to compete in “Rapid Relay”. In January and February 2025 they participated in two competitions in Florida and won judges’ awards at both events.
For the past six weeks, the team has been developing a single competition robot that will be used to compete in Dallas.
Team members are: Nathan Abbott (9), Brianna Atkinson (12), Omya Arora (11), Kai Latif (9), Meeraa Muthukumar (11), Ava Stephano (9), Aaron Sanchez (8) and Antonio Sanchez (11). The group has been invited to represent Cayman in the opening ceremony “Parade of Nations” on May 12 (available through livestream on Monday 12 May at VexWorlds.tv).
345Robotics coaches and certified VexIQ robotics instructors include Brandon Ebanks and Kendra Okonski, and both will accompany the team along with parents. Brandon is a 2025 nominee for the event’s Vex “Inspiration All Star” Award.
345Robotics (www.345robotics.org) is a registered Cayman Islands non-profit organisation. Its premiere sponsorship for the 2024-25 season (VexIQ “Rapid Relay”) has been in partnership with Enterprise Cayman, which has provided ongoing space at Signal House for our activities during weekends and during school holidays.
About the VexIQ Robotics Competition:https://www.vexrobotics.com/competition
● More than 17,000 teams from 54 countries playing in over 1200 tournaments
● Local, regional, national, and world competitions
● Teamwork Challenge: Two teams working together to maximize their score
● Robot Skills Challenge: One robot playing alone against the clock – with a controller, and with an autonomous code
About 2024-2025 Challenge “Rapid Relay”: https://www.vexrobotics.com/iq/competition/viqc-current-game
