News

ADVICS Co., Ltd.

ADVICS CO., Ltd. (Head office: Kariya, Aichi, Japan; President: Takeshi Kawata) has become the first competitor ever to win the national ET Robocon championship in two successive years. ET Robocon is the annual Embedded Technology Software Design Robot Contest *1 organized by the Japan Embedded System Technology Association.

ET Robocon has been held annually in Japan since 2002 as a training ground for young engineers of embedded software *2, and has steadily gained more participants and wider attention. This year the contest attracted 337 teams representing companies, universities, technical schools and other organizations.
ADVICS engineers have competed in ET Robocon since 2006, as a voluntary activity outside regular work duties. This year's team was made up of ten employees, mostly in their first or second year with the company in the areas of brake control algorithms and software development.
Starting in July the team worked closely together, emphasizing software reliability and focusing on winning the bonus stage of the ET Robocon competition course, which is the most difficult. The efforts paid off on November 14 and 15 at the final round of ET Robocon 2012 in Yokohama, as the ADVICS team won the national championship in the combined category of modeling design and race for the second year in a row.

ADVICS supports its young engineers' participation in ET Robocon as a way to gain experiential training in integrated software development, from planning and design through completion.
The ADVICS commitment to outstanding training for engineers is part of the company's strategy as a global technology leader in developing safe and comfortable braking systems for the future of automotive industry


*1 Each ET Robocon team analyzes and designs its own software for a standard hardware (robot) to travel autonomously along a standard course. Entries are judged for the speed and safety enabled by the software, with scoring in two categories: the modeling design, and the race.
The course includes a basic stage and a bonus stage where extra points are available for completion within a time limit.

*2 Software for microcomputer control that is installed in devices ranging from mobile phones to factory machines, automobiles and household appliances.