AutoDrive Challenge™

June 5-14, 2021 │ Ann Arbor, Michigan

SAE International and General Motors have partnered to headline sponsor AutoDrive Challenge™, the latest of SAE International’s Collegiate Design Series.

This newly established, three-year autonomous vehicle competition will task students to develop and demonstrate a full autonomous driving passenger vehicle. The technical goal of the competition is to navigate an urban driving course in an automated driving mode as described by SAE Standard (J3016) level 4 definition by year three.

Throughout the AutoDrive Challenge™ competition cycle, students and faculty will be invited to attend technology-specific workshops to help them in their concept refinement and overall autonomous technical understanding. The competition consists of eight teams from select universities that were invited to participate in the inaugural competition.

SAE AutoDrive Challenge: Year 2

Learn more about this newly established three-year autonomous vehicle competition, tasking students to develop and demonstrate a fully autonomous driving passenger vehicle.

Year 1 (2018) focused on the concept selection for the university teams by having them become familiar with their sensing and computation software. They were tasked with completion of a concept design written paper as well as simple missions for on-site evaluation, located in Yuma, AZ.

Year 2 (2019) focused on urban environment driving scenarios with static and dynamic objects. This will be located at Mcity, a one-of-a-kind urban test facility that simulates a broad range of complexities that vehicles encounter in urban and suburban driving environments.

Year 3 (2020) will focus on urban environment driving scenarios that have teams optimizing perception and sensing algorithms to navigate a fictitious rider sharing scenario through the Transportation Research Center’s SMART Center. This will include a longer continuous autonomous drive than the past two years in which teams will encounter both static and dynamic objects, traffic control lights and signs, as well as various lane line scenarios. Teams will be integrating HERE Mapping into their Year 3 Dynamic Challenges, focusing their Social Responsibility report on writing accessibility standards for a growing mobility industry, and refining their Concept Design to highlight innovative additions. 

Year 4 (2021) is the last year of this inaugural series of the AutoDrive Challenge™ competition and will challenge the teams to show what the previous 3 years of development and learning has produced. The teams will face 2 Dynamic Challenges in this last year. One will be a culminating drive linking together all the elements and features experienced in the previous 3 years. The second will be SAE Standard (J3016) Level 4 proof of concept demonstration drive. Additionally, teams will be required to generate reports, presentations, and perform simulations to highlight their work and communicate what they have learned.

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