Volnoe Delo Oleg Deripaska Foundation and GAZ Group being a part of one of the biggest Russian diversified industrial groups Basic Element in cooperation with Skolkovo Foundation held RoboCross-2015 contest of automated vehicles in Nizhny Novgorod. The race of robotic vehicles took place at the test field of GAZ plant on 13-17 July. RoboCross is held under «Robotics. Engineering personnel of innovational Russia» program, which is implemented by Volnoe Delo Foundation under support of GAZ Group.
Volnoe Delo Oleg Deripaska Foundation and GAZ Group under support of Skolkovo Foundation held RoboCross-2015 contest of automated vehicles. The overall winner of the contest was Avrora team from Ryazan State Radio Engineering University, which demonstrated effective engineering solutions implemented on GAZelle vehicle to improve functionality for unmanned driving conditions. The winning team got the right to take part in ElRob European Robotics Contest in 2016. Faust team from Moscow Aviation Institute won the “Best Engineering Solution” nomination.
The winners of other contest nominations are as follows: “Team work” – FSUE NAMI, “Jury award” – UMiCo (Moscow University of Machine Building), “Systematic approach” – MK-Ultra-NN (combined team of N.Novgorod Automotive Technical School and N.Novgorod State Technical University named after R.Е. Alekseev), “Commitment to success” – KSTA Team (Kovrov State Technical Academy), “Best in open class” – LOOK team (Ryazan State Radio Engineering University). The first place in testing of “Unmanned aerial systems” was taken by Le Talo team (Le Talo Robotics, Vladimir).
The contest jury consisted of engineers of GAZ Group United Engineering center. The teams were supported by employees and youth core group of GAZ plant, students and teachers of the basic educational institutions of GAZ and robotics hobby groups of Nizhny Novgorod.
18 student teams from the leading higher educational institutions of Moscow, Nizhny Novgorod, Ryazan, Kovrov and Vladimir took part in the contest. The majority of teams had taken part in RoboCross several times on GAZelle vehicles presented by GAZ plant to the most active participants of the program. It was the second year when RoboCross included not only land vehicles, but also unmanned aerial systems.
All participants of the final contest decently demonstrated their abilities in robotics: the vehicles converted by the students supported and consulted by the engineers of GAZ Group and Resource Center of Robotics program successfully passed a number of tests. In the course of the contest the vehicles independently took a number of exercises on the land and in the sky in fully automatic or telemetry mode using information of the Global Navigation Satellite System (GLONASS). The realistic situation was simulated for the teams, when an unmanned vehicle should independently run through a route with obstacles, make turns and other maneuvers, including those engaging the reverse gear. In addition to the independent flight during the contest, the unmanned aerial platforms fulfilled “Reconnaissance” task, including photographic survey of particular terrain features based on the predefined reference coordinates.
It was the first time when the main autonomous vehicle contest comprised Skolkovo Open Cup, where the teams demonstrated abilities of their robots in fully independent “Parallel parking” exercise. The winner was Avrora Robotics team (Avrora design bureau, Ryazan), which will get a grant from Skolkovo Foundation.
During RoboCross the students took a tour to production sites of GAZ plant, visited exhibition of new GAZ Group products, appreciated the show of Sadko NEXT and Sadko sport cars, which had taken part in rally raids, and met with the management of the company.
Maxim Petrov, Head of Robotics Program of Volnoe Delo Oleg Deripaska Foundation:
– Compared with the first RoboCross contest the youth teams have significantly developed their robotics skills. Today their automated vehicles have a significantly improved intellect and perform more complicated tasks close to the realistic road situations. GAZ vehicles converted by the students represent multipurpose platforms for implementation of efficient engineering solutions and development of engineering skills.
Gunter Heiden, COO of GAZ Group:
– RoboCross contest is a goodlaunch site for further youth development in engineering and designing of automated systems. For GAZ Group, the Robotics Program gives a unique opportunity to involve the gifted young people in solving of production automation and robot application issues. The best creative teams of the Robotics Program will be introduced to the high-end technologies of GAZ. We set specific production task to the students and school children, and wait for such guys at our plants. More than 40 representatives of the program have already joined our engineering school and become competent participants of implementation of the high-end technologies at GAZ Group plants.
