The 18th ABU ROBOCON took place in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia on 25 August, hosted by MNB. 17 teams from 16 countries and region gathered at Buyant Ukhaa Sport Palace in Ulaanbaatar and competed heated matches by robots.

This year’s theme was “Great Urtuu”, which was a relay messenger system innovated by the nomadic Mongolians. Mongol officials and envoys carried a tablet called Gerege to signify certain privileges and authority.

In the ABU Robocon, each team had two messenger robots. Messenger-Robot 1, which is a manual robot, carries a Gerege from the starting point and passes it to the Messenger-Robot 2, which is an automatic robot. Once the Messenger-Robot 2 successfully receives the Gerege, it directs to the elevated place called Mountain Urtuu and raise the Gerege on top of the mountain. Each team competed to raise the Gerege faster than the other team.

Out of 17 teams, 8 team advanced to the Final round, which included 2 Mongolian teams. The quarterfinal matches were; Hong Kong vs Indonesia, Mongolia 2 vs China, Vietnam vs Thailand and Mongolia 1 vs Japan. Hong Kong, China, Vietnam and Mongolia 1 won the match respectively.

The semi-final matches were; Hong Kong vs China and Vietnam vs Mongolia 1. Hong Kong and Mongolia 1 won the match respectively.

The final match was between Hong Kong and Mongolia 1, and Hong Kong won the Grand-Prix for the first time. The ABU ROBOCON Award, which is presented to the most excellent robot in terms of ingenuity and high technical skill, went to the Lac Hong University, Vietnam.

The ABU ROBOCON 2020 will be held in Suva, Fiji, hosted by Fiji TV. The theme of the contest is “Robo Rugby 7s”, which was officially announced during the Ulaanbaatar contest.