Message from ESN President & CEO
Cade Metz and Erin Griffith, seasoned writers for The New York Times, published a story in May, entitled “This was supposed to be the year driverless cars went mainstream,” and then explained why we are still years off. Multiple other publications have followed suit, saying that there aren’t enough roads permitted for testing, that the tech companies working in autonomy are running through investment funding without revenue coming in, and that there are a limited number of experts who can develop the algorithms and software to program a Level 4 self-driving car, let alone a Level 5 fully autonomous vehicle.
This is precisely why Energy Systems Network (ESN), working with the Indianapolis Motor Speedway (IMS), started the Indy Autonomous Challenge (IAC). Our goal: accelerate the pace of the autonomous mobility industry, leveraged by the human intelligence of 500+ undergrads, grads, PhDs, and expert mentors from 39 universities around the world. Thirty teams have registered to take on the challenge of developing software that could race a modified Dallara IL-15 racecar in the world’s first autonomous racecar head-to-head competition around the IMS, at speeds up to 200 mph.
Some say the industry hasn’t advanced because we don’t have ample roads regulated for testing. At the IAC, we don’t need roads because we have the world’s most famous racetrack, whose history goes back to 1909 as the testing ground for new technologies for commercial and race vehicles. In this October issue of The Leaderboard, we look at why ESN initiated this university prize competition, how Indiana incentivizes the auto manufacturing and racing industries and how we intend to drive the autonomous vehicle industry with new technologies, new players, new concepts and new parameters — breaking preconceived notions of what is possible, technological barriers and certainly speed limits.
Paul Mitchell
President & CEO
Energy Systems Network