Next-Gen Electric Vehicle R&D lands Canadian funding

General Motors of Canada, Waterloo-based Maplesoft Inc. and a research team at the University of Waterloo have entered a five-year, $10.5-million partnership to engineer a next-generation electric vehicle. Through model-based design and prototype testing, the team will investigate crucial technologies for achieving more widespread use of electric vehicles.

The research is being supported by the Automotive Partnership Canada (APC) with the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC) as the lead agency. APC is contributing $3.6 million, in addition to $2.5 million from the Ontario Research Fund.

The development and validation of key enabling technologies such as vehicle stability control, power management systems, and battery monitoring and charging devices will be important focus areas for the research team, led by Dr. Amir Khajepour from the University of Waterloo.

The technologies originating from Waterloo will also be tested by GM vehicle development teams. Engaging the research team in the vehicle development process will provide them with a unique opportunity to gain insight into bringing new technology concepts to market, and help transform the research findings into an integrated technological solution.

Maplesoft, a leading developer of high performance physical modeling and simulation software, will incorporate the researchers’ ideas into new design tools that GM’s staff can apply during their routine engineering work.

GM and the University of Waterloo have also involved on a related R&D project in software engineering between GM, IBM and McMaster University called the Network on Engineering Complex Software Intensive Systems for Automotive Systems (NECSIS). NECSIS is a $16.6 million national research network with a specific focus on automotive software systems.
www.gm.ca
www.maplesoft.com