WorldSkills: Representing Team UK in Robotics on the World Stage
15 Sep 2026
Peter Jenkins, a Mechanical Engineering Technician Apprentice at Daresbury Laboratory, will represent Team UK in Robotic Systems Integration at the WorldSkills international competition in Shanghai, China.
Often described as the “Skills Olympics”, every two years the global tournament brings together the most talented apprentices and young professionals to go head-to-head in a high-stakes battle of skills, in areas from bricklaying to 3D games design.
With 1,500 competitors (28 of which are from the UK) from over 80 countries, this year’s skills spectacular is expected to attract more than 250,000 visitors to Shanghai’s National Exhibition and Convention Centre, including government leaders, global employers and education experts. The event’s opening and closing ceremonies will be held at the Shanghai World Expo Cultural Centre, which can welcome an audience of over 18,000 people.
Peter’s journey to his official place on Team UK was long and intense. Set on his path by the Inspiring Skills Excellence in Wales framework in 2024, he won silver at the Welsh regional competition and the national finals. Despite this, Peter did not make Team UK.
Unwilling to give up, he began training in a new discipline, Additive Manufacturing, once again winning silver in the Welsh competition. However, just before the national finals, Peter received the news of his selection for the Robotic Systems Integration UK Squad.
Since then, he has trained extensively and competed worldwide: with friendly events in Porto, Portugal and Budapest, Hungary and the latest ‘pressure test’ in Guangzhou, China against competitors from six other countries.
Fostering a passion for engineering from a young age, Peter began developing his skills with a build-your-own robotic arm he received for Christmas, before studying a robotics unit at Wales’s Coleg Menai, and eventually starting his apprenticeship at STFC.
During the Welsh regional competition, Peter and his teammate Sion used a robotic arm to safely move industrial waste barrels from one pallet to the next and dispatch them onto a truck without any human intervention.
In the UK qualifier, they were challenged to move a cylinder from one pallet to another and through a maze, without touching the sides – they were the only competitors in their heat to succeed! Recently, Peter repeated this task, managing to complete it within an hour. This is an impressive achievement considering the original qualifier took over six hours to complete.
For the competition in Shanghai, Peter will be competing alongside his teammate Pratham Lohia, a master’s student at Middlesex University.
The experience so far has been genuinely life-changing. I am incredibly nervous, but excited at the same time. It's a really hard emotion to explain, because while these high-stress competitions are happening, it feels like the worst thing in the world. But afterwards, even the same day, I just want to get back in and do another one.
Peter shared this when asked about the upcoming competition.
Team UK will compete in the international Robotic Systems Integration finals from the 22nd to the 27th of September, facing challengers from across the world. We wish Peter and Pratham the best of luck with their upcoming competition!
