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ATU team wins first place in international Robothon Grand Challenge 2025
Four ATU students are all PhD researchers on the HEA TU RISE programme co-financed by the Government of Ireland and European Regional Development Fund (ERDF)
Four PhD researchers from Atlantic Technological University (ATU) have won first place in the prestigious international robotics competition, the Robothon Grand Challenge 2025, hosted recently by Technical University of Munich (TUM) MIRMI in Germany.
The TU RISE research students Dipshikha Das, Ali Al Abbas, Abdullah Haider Ali and Camillo Murgia, all living in Galway city, beat off competition from a field of eight international competitors from Germany, Ireland, India and UAE. They built a robot solution that can perceive and react intelligently in different scenarios as the team explains: “We tackled five core tasks ranging from vision-guided tasks to tool use and also designed our Bring Your Own Device challenge (BYOD) to demonstrate transferable skills and adaptability. It was an incredible opportunity to apply our skills, research and creativity, and we are proud of how our team came together to deliver a robust, responsive system. We are thrilled our team Atlabotics has won first place and we thank the organisers and Peter So from Technical University of Munich MIRMI for creating such a thoughtful and inspiring competition, and to everyone who supported us along the way.”
Dr Philip Long, mentor and lecturer, ATU Galway, says: “I’m really proud of the team for winning first place at the Robothon Grand Challenge 2025. They developed an advanced vision-based robotic manipulation system in a very short space of time, a testament to the state-of-the-art research they’re conducting as part of their PhD programmes. It’s a fantastic achievement on the international stage and a great example of their creativity, technical ability, and teamwork.
All four are PhD researchers at ATU through the HEA’s TU RISE programme, co-financed by the Government of Ireland and the European Union via the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) under the Southern, Eastern & Midland and Northern & Western Regional Programmes 2021–27.”
Three of the research students, Ali Al Abbas, Camillo Murgia and Dipshikha Das are registered under the School of Engineering (Dept of Mechanical and Industrial Engineering) in ATU Galway, while Abdullah Haider Ali is registered under the School of Engineering (Dept of Electronic and Mechanical Engineering) in ATU Letterkenny.
For further information on the event and the winners, see the TUM MIRMI website:
https://www.mirmi.tum.de/en/mirmi/news/article/victory-for-irish-university-team-at-fourth-robothon-grand-challenge/
Pictured are the winning team, L to R: Abdulllah Haider Ali, Dipshikha Das, Camillo Murgia, and Ali Al Abbas, all are currently based at the ATU Galway campus.
About Robothon
Robothon Grand Challenge is a prestigious international robotics competition and one of the core pillars of the Munich hi-tech platform at automatica, Europe’s leading robotics and automation trade fair.
The competition started with a virtual launch event where teams receive the final rules, guidelines, and scoring criteria. From that point, participants enter an intensive four-week development sprint to design and build an autonomous robotic solution capable of tackling the year’s challenge on a standardized electronic task board.
The 2025 edition introduces five brand-new manipulation tasks, each progressively more difficult and designed to test intelligent perception, precise control, and adaptive behavior. These tasks simulate realistic scenarios in electronic waste handling — with a special focus on touchscreen interaction and transferable manipulation skills.
Teams were evaluated not only on how many tasks they completed, but also on execution speed, robustness, and creativity in both hardware and software design. Their solutions were judged by the Grand Challenge Jury, made up of prominent figures from AI, robotics research, and industry. Top-performing teams were recognized at the Robothon Award Ceremony, held live on the RIG Stage at automatica 2025 in Munich — with a total prize pool of €16,000.
About TU RISE
As part of the TU RISE funding call, ATU launched RISE@ATU as a four-year research initiative to link academic research with regional enterprise. RISE@ATUaims to enhance central research functions within the technological university sector to further institutions’ engagements with their regions.
The scheme has two key outcomes:
- Establishment and/or development of central research functions in institutions to support research capacity building and further engagement with regions.
- Enhancement of institutional research capacity through increasing researcher human capital in research areas that have potential to facilitate stronger engagement with regional enterprises aligned to Ireland’s Smart Specialisation Strategy and Regional Enterprise Plans.
