Technische Universität München
TUM wins Indy Autonomous Challenge
TECHNICAL UNIVERSITY OF MUNICH
NEWS RELEASE
Racing car with artificial intelligence wins in Las Vegas
TUM wins again at the Indy Autonomous Challenge in the USA
- Race victory at the CES electronics trade fair
- Findings contribute to the development of autonomous cars
- Upcoming races will take place in Monza and Abu Dhabi
Victory in Las Vegas for the TUM Autonomous Motorsport Team! Once again, the Technical University of Munich (TUM) has proven that autonomous driving can also work successfully on the race track at top speeds. As part of the Indy Autonomous Challenge, universities have been competing against each other with fully automated racing cars since 2021, testing the limits of sensor technology and artificial intelligence (AI).
TUM's autonomous racing car again took first place in the Indy Autonomous Challenge. The race took place during the CES electronics trade fair at the Las Vegas Motor Speedway, an oval track usually used for the famous NASCAR races in the USA. Without any drivers and thanks to revised algorithms and the appropriate sensor technology, the Munich team managed to bring victory to Bavaria at around 250 km/h.
For the race, all racing teams work with the same cars and, therefore, the same hardware, such as sensors and computers. However, the teams write the intelligent software for the competition themselves. TUM makes its code freely available as an open-source project, which is why other teams can access it.
More degrees of freedom for TUM racing cars
This year, the TUM team has integrated a revised software structure and a new path planner into the vehicle. In the future, the planner will also be used on classic circuits, giving the car more freedom. A new algorithm that can localize the vehicle independently and precisely with the help of collected sensor data was also tested for the first time. "The fact that our adapted and newly developed systems helped us to win makes us incredibly happy. We knew that our software worked, but we also greatly revised our algorithms this year. Gaining victorious from the competition naturally encourages us to work more. However, we are already working on fine-tuning the software for future races," explains team boss Simon Hoffmann.
Prof. Thomas F. Hofmann, President of TUM, said: "And once again, we can congratulate the team on a great performance! Once again, TUM Autonomous Motorsport proves that curiosity, team spirit, and the conscious dissolution of the boundaries between theory and practice guarantee success. At TUM, we try every day to offer clever minds the right framework conditions to realize their ideas. I am pleased to see when these opportunities are used and turned into lasting success. We are proud of our winning team!"
Teams work towards the same vision despite competition
Despite the competition on the track, the different teams are not working against each other but on the same vision. What is learned during autonomous driving on the racetrack should later be used in general road traffic to ensure safety. "A technological leap like the one we experienced here in just one year of development was only possible thanks to the excellent cooperation between all the teams," says Prof. Markus Lienkamp from the Chair of Automotive Engineering at TUM. "We will soon be transferring our open source approach to road traffic and thus accelerating the pace of development even further. This will bring university competition from the race track to people's everyday lives."
Further races in Monza and Abu Dhabi
However, the race in Las Vegas will not be the last for the team; in 2024, TUM Autonomous Motorsport will be heading to legendary racetracks, among others. The team will prove itself on the Formula 1 circuit in Monza, a track that allows high speeds due to its layout. The Grand Prix circuit in Abu Dhabi is also on the agenda this year. The team also wants to show how much research into autonomous vehicles has progressed at TUM.
Additional Material for Media Outlets:
Photos for download: https://syncandshare.lrz.de/getlink/fiVeWTfoQjcaoK1NfJcu9F/
Subject matter expert:
Simon HoffmannTeamlead TUM Autonomous Motorsport
TUM Corporate Communications Center contact:
Andreas Huber
Media Relations
Tel. +49 89 289 10510
The Technical University of Munich (TUM) is one of Europe’s leading research universities, with more than 600 professors, 50,000 students, and 11,000 academic and non-academic staff. Its focus areas are the engineering sciences, natural sciences, life sciences and medicine, combined with economic and social sciences. TUM acts as an entrepreneurial university that promotes talents and creates value for society. In that it profits from having strong partners in science and industry. It is represented worldwide with the TUM Asia campus in Singapore as well as offices in Beijing, Brussels, Mumbai, San Francisco, and São Paulo. Nobel Prize winners and inventors such as Rudolf Diesel, Carl von Linde, and Rudolf Mößbauer have done research at TUM. In 2006, 2012, and 2019 it won recognition as a German "Excellence University". In international rankings, TUM regularly places among the best universities in Germany.