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ThinkPad's Off To Grand Prix |
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Written by Adam Gosling
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Friday, 16 March 2007 |
Lenovo's sponsorship of the AT&T Williams Formula One team kicks into high gear this weekend with the season opener in Melbourne.
The
company says since it announced the spsonsorship earlier this year they
have been working closely across a number of aspects, but the rubber
really hits the road this weekend with the first race at Albert Park,
in Melbourne from March 15-18 2007.
For
the Australian Grand Prix, 25 tons of air freight and 7 tons of sea
freight are required to get the team up and racing. Of this, IT
equipment forms an impressive 3 tons.
Two
dedicated IT people will travel to Melbourne to set this all up but
surprisingly it's a process that will take just 24 hours - a great deal
of the preparation work having been done back at base beforehand.
Information
technology is an essential element of any Formula One team, it
permeates all areas of the business, from the high visibility global
arena of the 17 races a year to the day to day manufacture of parts and
the administrative running of the company.
Alex Burns, Chief Operating Officer of Williams F1 explains, "IT
is fundamentally important in Formula One; our business is all about
the design, development and operation of racing cars and we use IT in
every step of the process."
"At
the factory, we use IT extensively in the development of the
aerodynamics of the car, in the design of the wind tunnel model parts,
the operation of the tunnels themselves and in the computational
analysis of airflows. We also use IT in the mechanical design of the
car and for the rapid manufacture of new parts."
"When
we get to the track we establish a complete network infrastructure in
the garage that is used to load data to and from the race cars and to
communicate the output of the many sensors on the cars to our
engineers, both at the track and back at our headquarters in the UK."
He said.
The
Williams team currently uses around 300 desktop PCs and 140 notebooks,
from engineering applications such as data processing to test areas
such as CAD data visualisation.
The
race team uses approximately 30 ThinkPad60p notebooks across all areas
of race team performance. They are used by the team's data engineers
and form an essential part of the ignition process. They are also used
in vehicle dynamics, systems engineering, control of fuel rigs and
strategy communications from the pit wall to the garage. Electrical,
engine and hydraulics technicians also use them. Engineers use them.
Marketing use them. And without them, the 5/20GB of telemetry data generated at an event could not be processed or read.
This
level of IT support requires an enormous amount of preparation and
planning. Since they joined the team in February, Lenovo says it has
been working hard with AT&T Williams to provide not only the
necessary hardware for the team to go racing this weekend but also the
network of support back at base.
"Formula
One provides an exciting platform to build Lenovo awareness in key
markets worldwide, and to showcase our products and their reliability.
This is a sport where cutting-edge technology is essential. We are
honored to join AT&T Williams and are motivated to work with the
team, its partners and the sport in building the Lenovo business and
Formula One" said Alan Munro, Chief Executive Officer, Lenovo Australia
& New Zealand.
As
the year progresses Lenovo will look forward to both strengthening and
diversifying its support of the AT&T Williams team. This weekend
however, the focus is very much on the important part they will play in
getting the cars on track.
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