"Robotex is now in its 24th season. Globally, 50,000 young engineers come to our festivals throughout the year to compete," said Robotex CEO Nathan Metsala. "On December 6, the season finale will take place at the Unibet Arena, with nearly 3,000 competitors from 34 countries competing in various events."

The festival will feature a variety of robotics competitions, including Lego sumo, roller rally, drone rally and car racing. What makes all the competitions special, according to Metsala, is that they take place using fully autonomous robots.

"Humans don't control anything [about the robots] by remote control. Competitors put their robots into the arena, press start and then take their hands away. The robots have to solve the task themselves," he added.

According to Metsala, Robotex  offer basic engineering knowledge to those who interested, adapted according to people's different levels of ability.

"Even pre-school children are very interested in robotics. One of our biggest sections is the Roboliiga competition, which is for pre-school children, and around 1,100 children are expected to take part in this competition alone. Children get excited about robotics very quickly and this interest lasts for a long time," said Metsala.

Metsala brought a small 3D-printed robot to the ETV studio, which he said is the next level in Lego robots and can teach children the basics of industrial design, in addition to just robotics.

"The basics of industrial design are important because programming and logic, math and physics, everything that is involved in robotics as well as the basics of industrial design, is exactly the same at university as it is in pre-school," said Metsala.

"If we are able to teach young people these basics earlier, we will ensure both the future of robotics and young people's interest in becoming manufacturing engineers, which is very much needed in the world and in Estonia even more so," Metsala explained.

In Metsala's experience, the process of getting a young person to continue to study robotics at university already begins when they are at primary school, where they have more or less decided what they want to do.

Robotex, the world's biggest robotics competition, takes place on this Friday and Saturday (December 6 and 7) at the Unibet Arena in Tallinn. In addition to competitions, there will also be several workshops, which people can register for on the spot.

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