Austrian companies AVL Racing and STARD (Stohl Advanced Research and Development) have announced they have formed a technical partnership focusing on the simulation, development and testing of high-performance EV powertrain solutions and vehicles.
The companies have established a multi-year action plan to develop and build several tailor-made EV powertrain specific software tools, testing solutions and dyno facilities together. These developments will incorporate Rallycross and rally-oriented solutions, such as a specific driving simulator cockpit for the AVL Driving Simulator in Graz, Austria.
“We cannot think of any entity to be a more capable or better suited partner than AVL Racing to cooperate with on further improving our pioneering EV motorsport solutions and engineering,” said Manfred Stohl, Stohl Group president.
Following a close project-related cooperation in recent years, both companies will now expand their activities in several areas, from entire EV vehicle and powertrain simulation, including development of new simulation tools for EV powertrain components, to entire HIL (hardware-in-the-loop) dyno testing and the use of DIL (driver-in-the-loop) simulation.
“Electric race cars are already an important addition to motorsport and this trend will only strengthen in the future,” said Ellen Lohr, director, motorsport at AVL Racing. “We are seeing a big demand for electric powertrains and powerful battery technologies. With our new Battery Innovation Center in Graz, we are able to produce racing batteries at an extremely high level. Our goal is to play a key role here, too, just as we already do in many other areas of motorsport.”