Exclusive | Williams Formula One team in race to adopt AI system
The third most successful team in Formula One history is looking to adopt AI in a quest to improve its performance and stay competitive in the sport
Williams, the Formula One team, is on the lookout for technology companies that they can collaborate with in applying artificial intelligence (AI) to help improve their racing performance.
“We’re looking for technology and if we can get access to the latest technology before our competitors, that gives us the edge,” Williams chief information officer Graeme Hackland said in an interview at the RISE technology conference in Hong Kong on Tuesday. “We handle a lot of data and as of now most of it is analysed manually.”
Williams generates about 800 gigabytes of on-track data in each round of the 21-race Formula One season, from information about the engine and tyres to weather and video footage. All of that data is currently processed by specialists, who might then narrow down a segment of the race and send it to the engineers for a closer look.
By employing AI technologies, such as machine learning, and big data, Williams hopes to be able to identify correlations between the multitude of variables that were previously not possible using just human experts, according to Hackland.
The British racing team now uses cloud software from technology company Acronis to back up and protect its telemetry data and other crucial information.
