Team 1492 registered for the 2004 robotics competition just under the wire as it was launched by a group of dedicated students and parents primarily from Xavier College Preparatory and Phoenix Country Day School. Together with the generous sponsorship of Microchip Technology, Inc. who furnished monetary and physical support, monetary support from Motorolla, Inc. and mentoring by local engineers, despite the last minute flurry Team Caution made a decent showing at the 2004 AZ Regional Competition.

Emboldened by the new found experience, the 2005 Team Caution took on some additional membership and acquired the mentoring assistance of Mike Rush, an ASU researcher. With the advantage of a pre-season, the team held a series of pre-season informational sessions to acquaint the students with some of the "nuts and bolts" of robotic technology before the build season. The sessions were made possible by the generous cooperation of ITT Technical Institute. New sponsors appeared on the scene including Access Laserpress, Mainframe, Inc., and Freescale Semiconductor, Inc. The students were also involved with a local radio station that hosted talk show "Prime Time Students" that followed the progress of the robot planning, build and testing phases, as well as broadcasting from the regional competition itself.

FIRST was founded in 1989 by Dean Kamen, inventor of the Segway Human Transporter (HT).  FIRST operated the FIRST Robotics Competition in which teams of high school students, sponsored and assisted by local companies and volunteers design, assemble and test a robot capable of performing a specified task in competition with other teams.  FIRST also runs the FIRST LEGO Leauge, for children 9-14 years old, and FIRST Place, an innovative science and technology center, including hands on children's science museum.

FIRST was founded on partnerships with businesses, educational institutions and government. Approximetly 500 companies provide funding, donations and wonderful volunteers to support the program.