[IKE]

My only caution would be to warn that collaboration is not easier.

When done right, you can end up with a technically superior product from additional prototyping and sharing.

When done poorly, you can end in gridlock and not get robots done in time. You can also get a compromise by commitee design that isn't particularly good at anything.

Collaboration on the scale of "identical" machines can be quite difficult. It can also be interesting when one team clearly outperforms the other with identical machines.

I would recommend trying to talk it through with some of the teams that have tried it in the past. You could try a call-in similar to the EWCP guys as the pros and cons of collaboration would make a great topic.