Indy Autonomous Challenge announces next competition at Texas Motor Speedway

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All of the racecars for the 2022 Indy Autonomous Challenge have been updated to deliver 30% more power, making them faster than ever before. | Credit: IAC

The Indy Autonomous Challenge Powered by Cisco at Texas Motor Speedway will run on November 11 and mark the IAC’s return to racing

The Indy Autonomous Challenge (IAC) today announced that after a record-setting competition at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway last October, and making history at CES 2022 in January with the world’s first-ever, head-to-head autonomous racing competition, it will return to racing at another iconic track with “The Indy Autonomous Challenge Powered by Cisco” at the Texas Motor Speedway on Friday, November 11th, 2022 in Fort Worth, TX.

Presenting sponsor Cisco Systems, Inc. (Cisco) will enable critical in-vehicle and car-to-trackside connectivity with Dallara AV-21 racecars using ultra-low latency wireless technology for the head-to-head autonomous racecar competition where nine IAC teams will seek to compete.

The IAC competition and the Dallara AV-21 race vehicles are a laboratory for all of the technology at the heart of the machines. This event pushes all of the components to the limits of its capabilities. The data gathered helps product teams improve the system’s capabilities. Ultimately these features will find their place in commercial and consumer solutions in the future.

“Our goal is to bring the brightest minds and top innovators of our time together at iconic racetracks around the world to push autonomous driving technology forward,” said Paul Mitchell, president, Indy Autonomous Challenge. “Through complex problem solving and first-of-its-kind engineering, our teams work with leading industry sponsors like Cisco to advance technology that will speed the commercialization of fully autonomous vehicles and deployments of advanced driver-assistance systems (ADAS).”

Teams competing at the “Indy Autonomous Challenge Powered by Cisco” at Texas Motor Speedway will be operating Dallara AV-21 autonomous racecars equipped with a boosted engine package, capable of delivering 30% more horsepower than the last time they raced to push high-speed multi-agent racing to its limits.

With its upgraded engine package, an IAC racecar programmed by team PoliMOVE from Politecnico di Milano (Italy) and the University of Alabama (USA) set a new land speed world record of 192.2 MPH ( 309.3 KPH) at the historic Kennedy Space Center in April prompting the adoption of refreshed technology on all IAC racecars moving forward.

Cisco powers the in-vehicle networking and connectivity to and from the vehicles for race safety, telemetry data offload, and GPS timing alignment. The connectivity infrastructure includes Cisco Ultra-Reliable Wireless Backhaul for highly reliable mobile connectivity and Cisco Catalyst Industrial Ethernet switches to connect in-vehicle sensors and on-board compute.

“Cisco is proud to be the presenting sponsor, for the second consecutive year, of the Indy Autonomous Challenge and bring the IAC to the Texas Motor Speedway, empowering academic innovation to further autonomous development and improve safety and performance,” said Wes Sylvester, Vice President, Cisco Industry Solutions Group. “We are committed to driving the future of connectivity forward for every type of automated industry, and you couldn’t ask for a more ideal testing and proving ground to push the boundaries of innovation than the Indy Autonomous Challenge.”

Teams arrived at Texas Motor Speedway on Sept 28, 2022 for an initial week of practice and will then return for practice October 24, 2022 through race day on November 11, 2022, where the competition will be live broadcast via Twitch in partnership with Amazon Web Services (AWS).

The teams will also race at the 2023 CES event at the Las Vegas Motor Speedway on January 7, 2023. This race event is open only to CES attendees. If you are going to CES 2023, be sure to reserve a seat by selecting the race event in your registration.