The Formula for Student Success
Published Tue 8 Jul 2008
Autodesk has announced its sponsorship of the Formula Student 2008 event at Silverstone, this year increasing its investment to Partner level.
The event takes place from the 10 - 13 July 2008 at the legendary Silverstone race circuit. Competing this year are 116 teams from 99 universities in 21 countries, including 29 universities entering for their first time. The competition challenges university students to design, build, develop and market a single-seat racing car. In order to win the students must work as a team and balance speed with safety, reliability, cost and handling qualities.
The Formula Student event is the biggest of its kind in Europe and is run by the Institution of Mechanical Engineers in partnership with a number of sponsors including Autodesk. The event promotes careers and excellence in engineering and provides students with real-life experience in design and manufacturing as well as the business elements involved in automotive engineering such as working as a team, under pressure and to tight deadlines.
Those who take a pit stop and visit Autodesk at the event will be provided with information on the Autodesk Student Engineering & Design Community. This pioneering community provides students with the ability to download free versions of Autodesk software as well as high-quality training and learning resources, discussion groups and job postings. The site now has more than 300,000 members world-wide comprising of both students and educators and can be found at www.autodesk.com/educommunity
Representatives from Autodesk’s education, manufacturing and design solutions teams will also be on hand to offer participants advice on their designs and to provide information on Autodesk products and its innovative education programmes for universities and schools.
Alistair Brook, Education Manager for Europe, Middle East and Africa at Autodesk says, “An increasingly competitive world demands the talents of the world’s best and brightest. We are always keen to support initiatives that encourage students to excel in design and engineering and the prestigious Formula Student Event is a fantastic example of this.”
At the awards ceremony Autodesk will be presenting the winners of the “Class 1 Design”, “Best Newcomer” and “Best Individual Driver” award categories.
The event attracts entries form universities from all over the world including the UK, mainland Europe, the Americas, Asia and Australia and represents a valuable project blending academic learning with the development of practical engineering skills. Skills students can expect to learn include marketing, time management, project management, team building, budgeting, presentation skills and management issues.
