News Release
UDM Robotics Team takes first place at International Engineering Competition
For the second consecutive year, University of Detroit Mercy took home the top prize at the Intelligent Ground Vehicle Competition, held June 5-8 in Rochester, Michigan. 
Watch video footage from the winning team!
Fifty teams representing 43 schools constructed their robots and competed against other universities throughout the world. These included nationally recognized leaders in engineering education such as Princeton, Cornell, Georgia Tech, Olin and Rose-Hulman, and other Michigan universities: Michigan Tech, Lawrence Tech, Wayne State and University of Michigan-Dearborn. Competitors also included state universities from across the nation (including Florida, Maryland, Wisconsin, California, Nebraska, Texas and Pennsylvania), and international universities including University of Toronto and Ecole de Technologie Superieure [Canada]).
"Our students worked extremely hard and were able to achieve a high score in their last attempt in the Autonomous Challenge, which enabled the team to take overall first place in the IGVC," said Electrical Engineering Professor Mark Paulik.
The IGVC is an annual international competition created to offer cutting-edge design experience to engineering students. The competition consisted of three challenge events: Autonomous Challenge, Navigation Challenge, and the Design Competition. The scores from each of these events are combined to determine the overall First Place Grand Award winner.
The University of Detroit Mercy team received the 2009 First Place Grand Award. University of Delaware placed second.
"This win reflects not only the hard work and competitiveness of our team and faculty mentors, but also UDM’s innovative curriculum that employs autonomous vehicles as a vertically integrative platform," said UDM Engineering & Science Dean Leo Hanifin. "It’s a major accomplishment to win the IGVC Grand Prize for the second year in a row. This team’s success, and that of other UDM student teams, demonstrates the unparalleled competence of our students in designing and building complex systems that work."
He added, “Autonomous vehicles embody the future of engineered products. They are highly complex electro-mechanical systems with imbedded intelligence . . . like a wide variety of systems that are critical to the economic success and security of our nation.”
Release date: June 10, 2009
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