The Competition

The MATE ROV Competition is an international competition by the American organization MATE II (Marine Advanced Technology Education for Inspiration and Innovation). It is about small teams of students from all over the world designing and constructing an underwater robot (ROV) with which they have to solve several tasks at the competition. These tasks always refer to real-world problems, which are just scaled down for the competition. The international finals take place in a different American city every year. But before, there is a regional preliminary round in which we as a German team do not have to participate because the next venue is too far away. Instead, we must qualify for the international finals with a video in which you can see our ROV performing specific tasks underwater. 

There are four different competition classes to address as much students as possible: SCOUT, NAVIGATOR, RANGER and EXPLORER. In SCOUT class, already elementary school students can participate while performing less development work. We as a team participate in RANGER class. The highest level, EXPLORER class, is mainly designed for universities.

The teams of the students should be structured like a small company and are told to do more than just the development of their ROV. It is also assessed whether they are able to present the ROV in English in front of experts. Furthermore, they have to, among other things, expound how they have constructed their ROV in several documents. Of course, they have to consider their ROV's safety as well.

The mission of MATE II is to use marine engineering to challenge students to use science, technology and engineering as well as mathematics. This requires a lot of critical thinking, teamwork, entrepreneurship and innovation.