Antigua and Barbuda’s robotics team has claimed third place at the inaugural OECS Super Regional Robotics Challenge 2026, held at the St. Kitts Marriott Resort, competing against teams from across the Caribbean in a competition centred on the theme Innovating for a Sustainable Caribbean Future.

Micah Matthew and Michael Harvey, coached by their teacher Tijah Myers, represented the country in the first national delegation to the competition, which was organised by the Eastern Caribbean Robotics and Innovation Association (ECRIA) in collaboration with the St. Kitts and Nevis Robotics Association (SKNRA).

The five-day event brought together teams from Antigua and Barbuda, St. Vincent and the Grenadines, St. Maarten, St. Lucia, St. Kitts and Nevis, Anguilla, St. Eustatius, and Jamaica in what organisers described as the first competition of its kind in the Eastern Caribbean.

The challenge required teams to programme robots to collect sargassum seaweed and debris from a simulated coastline and deposit it into designated bins, with additional points awarded for navigating a ramp and placing plastic bottles into recycling containers.

The sub-theme, Robotics for a Cleaner Coastline and a Sustainable Caribbean, framed the competition within the broader environmental challenges facing small island states in the region.

Antigua and Barbuda progressed through the preliminary rounds, recording 36 points in an opening match Team St. Eustatius before advancing to the semi-finals, where the team faced St. Vincent and the Grenadines.

Antigua were outscored in that round but secured third place after defeating St. Lucia in the third-place match.

St. Vincent and the Grenadines won the competition outright, finishing with 1,336 points in the final against St. Maarten, which placed second with 128 points.

Dr. Ricard O’Neill, acknowledged as a driving force behind the regional robotics movement, addressed participants at the close of competition.

“This is not the end, this is the beginning,” he said, adding that planning for a 2027 edition of the Super Regional Challenge would begin shortly.