Mercedes-AMG Petronas Formula One Team Optimizes Wins With Data
How do you win while optimizing cost?
That is the question that Mercedes-AMG Petronas Formula One Team as the high-octane sport was carried during the COVID-19 pandemic. For the team, the answer lay in the TIBCO Cost Visualizer tool.
Mercedes-AMG Petronas Formula One already uses an array of TIBCO tools to tweak performance. The partnership has led to a continuous streak of wins at the podium and the FIA Formula One™ World Constructors’ Championship.
The new Cost Visualizer tool goes further. It helps the team visualize and predict manufacturing costs through a bill of materials and budgeting module. It allows the designers, engineers, and budget planners to better understand and predict the costs of manufacturing the Mercedes-AMG F1 W11 EQ Performance vehicle.
Each design engineer can now compare CAD work to all known financial data, which can be viewed, scrutinized, and evaluated from part manufacturing to vehicle assembly. When pooled into the budgeting tool, the team can forecast the cost of individual parts at the design stage and a whole car project.
“First, all of us at TIBCO would like to congratulate the Mercedes-AMG Petronas Formula One Team for winning its seventh consecutive FIA Formula One™ World Constructors’ Championship. The team’s innovative use of AI and visual analytics is a major force in its success, and we’re excited our TIBCO Connected Intelligence platform helps play a part in enabling the team to stay ahead in this highly competitive sport,” said Dan Streetman, chief executive officer, TIBCO. “Our ongoing partnership benefits both the team and all of TIBCO’s global customers, as we push the limits of modeling, simulation, and digital twin technologies, driving value for our users.”
This new process for tracking and measuring car development costs will help the team meet the new cost cap financial regulations announced by the FIA in October 2019, a requirement starting January 2021.
“Our sport relies on a team of experienced, talented individuals and technologists who understand that data is paramount. We want to know exactly what is happening behind the steering wheel, under the bodywork, and on the track at all times, and our partnership with TIBCO has enabled us to do precisely that,” said Toto Wolff, team principal, and chief executive officer, Mercedes-AMG Petronas Formula One Team. “Using the TIBCO Cost Visualizer tool gives us an additional edge, offering the team insights into the full costs of building, running, and manufacturing our race cars, whilst ensuring the data entered at source is accurate, giving us a critical advantage.”
Image credit: iStockphoto/efks
