Cambridge Tech Week 2025: A Spotlight on Innovation with Extend Robotics

Cambridge is no stranger to tech and deep-science breakthroughs, but this year’s Cambridge Tech Week (15–19 September 2025) firmly cemented the city’s reputation as a global innovation hub. With the theme “Seizing the AI Advantage,” the event brought together visionaries, researchers, founders, investors and policymakers from around the world, forging connections across sectors and geographies.

One of the crown jewels of the week was “Innovation Alley”, a two-day exhibition held at Cambridge Guildhall on 16–17 September. Its mission: to showcase the leading edge of applied tech, from early experimental prototypes to scaling companies.

Showcasing robotics, AI, digital twins, biotech, XR/VR, to clean technologies, and more, the audience ranged from academic collaborations to commercial pilots.

Speakers and panels spanned topics such as scaling deep tech, responsible AI, investing in frontier tech, and navigating regulation. The Start-up to Scale-up Day included a pitch competition integrated into Innovation Alley, giving selected ventures a platform to present to a live audience of investors and peers. More than 1,500 delegates, drawn from 30+ countries, attended the main conference sessions.

Extend Robotics showcasing their XR interface, combining immersive visualization with robotic control.

Spotlight on Extend Robotics: XR Meets Teleoperated Robotics

Amid the array of exciting innovations in Innovation Alley, Extend Robotics stood out as one of the most visually and conceptually compelling exhibits.

Described as “eye-catching” by the Cambridge Independent, Extend Robotics presented a robot operated using an extended reality (XR) interface, combining immersive visualisation with robotic control.  This immersive 3D visualisation enables users to train, operate, and automate multiple robots, even across geographically distant locations, making it far easier for non-experts to operate robots across industries.

By giving operators natural spatial awareness and real-time precision, it reduces training time, improves safety, and enables remote work in hazardous or hard-to-reach environments. Each teleoperation session also generates rich data, accelerating AI training and paving the way toward greater autonomy. Scalable across multiple robot platforms and compatible with both real and simulated environments, it delivers flexibility, efficiency, and a clear bridge between human skill and robotic capability.

This presence in Innovation Alley, alongside promising scaleups and tech pioneers, reinforced Extend Robotics’ credibility in the Cambridge and UK deep-tech ecosystem. For Extend Robotics, the demonstration of XR-enabled teleoperation captured imaginations, and presented our vision to the tech world in a tangible, immersive way.

This year’s Cambridge Tech Week reaffirmed why Cambridge sits at the intersection of academia, research, entrepreneurship, and global ambition. Innovation Alley served as a microcosm of that ambition, a place to see tomorrow’s breakthroughs today.

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