Third edition of the COMPETITION FOR KNOWLEDGE competition successfully completed

Young artists from the School Centre Slovenske Konjice-Zreče win first place.

For the third year in a row, Unior Hand Tools has successfully held the education and knowledge competition called Competition for Knowledge, which promotes innovation and the strategic linking of technical education with the real needs of industry. This year's challenge also encouraged young people to develop a concrete and useful product with the potential for series production at Unior. This year, the participants had to design and assemble a lightweight and foldable workbench that would become part of Unior's series production.

The winning solution comes from home

The winning product, a carefully thought-out and foldable field work table, was the project of the students of the School Centre Slovenske Konjice-Zreče, who won first place with their technical perfection and creative approach. Their solution proved to be the most suitable - both in terms of functionality and feasibility for series production. Second place went to the Ptuj School Centre and third place to the Postojna School Centre.

All the top three runners-up received one of the exciting Unior prizes for their place on the podium, which will only enrich their school workshops: - 1st place: School center Slovenske Konjice-Zreče - Unior trolley with tools - 2nd place: School Centre Ptuj, Mechanical Engineering School - empty Unior trolley - 3rd place: school center Postojna - Unior tool set

All the finalists' products were of high quality and, according to the jury, represent an important contribution to the understanding of practical challenges in today's industrial environment.

Real tasks, real challenges

As every year, the knowledge competition was a delight for young technical masters all over Slovenia, with five technical schools from Ptuj, Slovenske Konjice and Zreče, Postojna, Ravne na Koroškem and Maribor taking part in the competition. The students put in hundreds of hours of work, as this year's challenge consisted of building a so-called portable workbench, which had precisely defined dimensions (length 1. 000 mm, 600 mm wide, 850 mm high) and was to include the following specifications:

the table had to be foldable, as it would be used for transport to workplaces, for field work, etc.; it had to have two legs to adjust the height for levelling purposes; its load capacity was limited to 250 kg; it had to have two versions of work surface (wooden and inox (inox-coated plate)); rotation of the latter was not allowed; and its assimilability, including the legs, could not exceed the basic dimensions set.

However, since Unior's vision this time was to make the winning work part of the series production, the use of standard elements was necessary for reasons of price sensitivity. The very demand for quality, perfection in execution and precision in design was part of the vision of the previous competitions.

The complexity of the challenge was high, as the aim was to closely link innovation with realistic production feasibility - while strengthening technical understanding, teamwork and design competence.

Strategic integration of education and business

The Competition for Knowledge project is not just a competition - it is part of Unior's long-term strategy to actively contribute to the development of Slovenian technical education. There are around 25 technical secondary schools in Slovenia, where future machinists, mechatronics technicians, toolmakers and electricians are trained. Professions that require a strong synergy between theory and practice.

With this project, the company is building a bridge between the education system and industry, raising the profile of technical professions and putting young creators up against real challenges. The annual competition contributes to strengthening practical skills, raising students' motivation and spreading awareness of the importance of quality manual work.

With ideas that "take your breath away" and products that bear the stamp of innovation, the competition is becoming a recognized place for creating competent human resources for the future. We are already looking forward to next year, when we will once again open the doors to a new generation of young technical talent.