IU partnership to focus on AI-driven autonomous racing
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Indiana University is getting into the self-driving racing game.
The university said Thursday that its Luddy School of Informatics, Computing and Engineering in Bloomington is partnering with Indianapolis-based CODE19 Racing Inc., which bills itself the first professional autonomous racing franchise.
CODE19 said on its website it aims to design a program that can race cars similar to a person by “spearheading bleeding-edge advancements in the realm of AI.”
The partnership was kicked off with a three-day workshop for graduate students and faculty within the Luddy School, who will build the first AI driver for CODE19.
“As an IU alumni-founded startup, we are excited to partner with the IU Luddy School to develop the next generation of advanced AI for autonomous race cars,” CODE19 President Lawrence Walter said in a news release. “With the Luddy School at the controls, CODE19 will race in global competitions for autonomous race cars. These experimental competitions help accelerate the development of autonomous driving technology by providing a challenging and competitive environment for teams to test their AI drivers.”
The AI driver will be developed through the school’s Vehicle Autonomy and Intelligence Lab, led by Lantao Liu, an associate professor of intelligent systems engineering at the Luddy School. The IU partnership with the Naval Surface Warfare Center, Crane Division, will also support the development through support of a Ph.D. student.
The new partnership isn’t CODE19’s only IU connection; Walter is an alumnus of the Luddy School, and the company is a member of IU Ventures’ Founders and Funders Network.
“We are confident that our team has the skills and resources to manage winning AI drivers,” Walter said. “We are focused on competing globally and showing the world what IU can do on the race track.”
CODE19’s website has a call-out for IU Luddy students on its website.