Telford firm's engineering apprentices strike gold

Members of the team at Ricoh UK Products Ltd enjoyed success at the prestigious annual competition in Manchester.

Eve Redden, Kian Beasley and Harrison Felton landed gold medals, with silver medals for Kieran Rowley and Josh Wynne.

They initially entered the competition in March, working in small teams to design, manufacture and program a tricycle following a strict design brief set by World Skills.

A successful qualifier back in June saw both of RPL’s teams earn themselves a spot at the National Finals, where they competed against other UK-based teams including GE Aviation, Pullman Rail and Coleg Y Cymoedd.

During the National Finals, teams had two full days to fully remanufacture their tricycles under the watchful eye of the judging panel, as well as competing in a series of associated challenges.

RPL’s teams accumulatively scored maximum points for lowest costing product, lowest weight product, lowest toolbox weight, highest storage capacity, lowest packaged volume and fastest build.

RPL’s Learning & Development Officer, Claire Shepherd said: “Not only did our teams score maximum points in a number of categories, but both teams produced a very strong portfolio, which gained fantastic feedback from the judges.”

Apprentices collected their honours at an awards ceremony which took place at the Bridgewater Hall, Manchester.

Claire added: “We are delighted that RPL’s teams were awarded gold and silver medals for their efforts and would like to congratulate our apprentices and Mark Smith (Senior Engineer) who has mentored our apprentices throughout their World Skills journey, on their fantastic achievement!

“This exciting project has helped our apprentices to develop key engineering skills in a variety of different disciplines which will be valuable as they work towards completing their apprenticeships and also in pursuing their future engineering careers.

“Throughout their WorldSkills journey, our apprentices have displayed a number of Ricoh’s core values including teamwork, winning spirit, passion and innovation – we are incredibly proud of our apprentices and all they have achieved through their participation in this competition."