In 2024, Zebra Robotics sent its largest delegation yet to the World Robot Olympiad International Finals in Izmir, Türkiye — four teams, four categories, and a season’s worth of preparation put to the test on the world’s biggest robotics stage. Every team arrived having already won first place at both the GTA Regionals and Canada Nationals, and the results in Izmir reflected just how prepared they were.
Woodchucks — Nila Thiyagarajan, Riyanshi Sharma, and Shruti Nehete — competed in Future Innovators, Junior, with an AI-enabled robot designed to recognize and collect garbage on sidewalks. The judges took notice: their documentation and prototype were called near-perfect. The team carried that polish into the finals, closing out the competition in the top 20% globally.
Agribot — Zorez Gilani and Pranavkumar Redlapalli — brought a different kind of innovation to Future Innovators, Elementary: an agricultural robot that detects irregular ground levels in a field and levels it for microfarming. The project landed them in 5th place overall — a finish inside the top 8, prestigious enough to earn a mention at the WRO awards ceremony.
Miracle Monkeys — Vishnu Jeyakumar, Advik Bhagavatula, and Shlok Raval — ran a near-perfect Day 1 in Robo Mission Junior, putting themselves in strong position heading into Day 2. With the clock reading 5 seconds left on their final run — a run that had them on track for 7th place — the team triggered a program download that didn’t complete in time, forfeiting the run entirely. The team ultimately finished 23rd. It’s the kind of result that’s painful in the moment, but the kind of lesson — about timing, risk, and when to trust a result already in hand — that no classroom can teach quite the same way.
Alpha Nulls — Vedant Nehete and Devanshi Sharma — were nearly flawless from start to finish in Robo Mission Senior. A clean Day 1 set up an equally strong Day 2, and the team closed out the competition in 8th place overall — another finish inside the prestigious top 8, earning recognition on the awards stage.
From a top-8 finish to a five-second heartbreak, Izmir was a showcase of everything WRO is meant to test: not just engineering skill, but composure, timing, and the ability to perform when it matters most. Four teams, four different stories — and a Zebra Robotics delegation that left Türkiye with plenty to be proud of, and just as much to build on.