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World’s first flying electric car racing series, Airspeeder, partners with cyber protection firm Acronis

Air­speed­er, the world’s first elec­tric fly­ing car rac­ing series, has announced a tech­ni­cal and strate­gic part­ner­ship with Acro­nis, the glob­al leader in cyber pro­tec­tion.

The rac­ing series, cre­at­ed by per­for­mance elec­tric fly­ing car man­u­fac­tur­er, Alau­da, will receive tech­ni­cal and com­mer­cial sup­port from Acro­nis. The Acro­nis brand will also fea­ture in a promi­nent posi­tion on Airspeeder’s MK4 rac­ing craft.

Matt Pear­son, Founder, Alau­da & Air­speed­er, said: “At Air­speed­er, we are cre­at­ing an aer­i­al motor­sport dri­ven by inno­va­tion. Back­ing from Acro­nis, a busi­ness with an extra­or­di­nary cul­ture of tech­no­log­i­cal suc­cess in For­mu­la One and For­mu­la E rep­re­sents sig­nif­i­cant affir­ma­tion of our vision to accel­er­ate the next great mobil­i­ty rev­o­lu­tion through sport­ing com­pe­ti­tion.”

With first Air­speed­er GPs planned for 2021, Acro­nis’ cyber pro­tec­tion solu­tions will ensure the data secu­ri­ty for the rev­o­lu­tion­ary LiDAR and Machine Vision tech­nol­o­gy that will deliv­er close but safe rac­ing through the cre­ation of vir­tu­al force-fields around each rac­ing craft, named ‘Speed­ers’.

Part of this tech­nol­o­gy will be deliv­ered by Teknov8, a glob­al provider of cyber secu­ri­ty solu­tion that will sup­port Acro­nis’ part­ner­ship with Air­speed­er as an Offi­cial #Cyber­Fit Deliv­ery Part­ner.

Acro­nis’ secure data analy­sis solu­tions cur­rent­ly enhance the per­for­mance of some of the most cel­e­brat­ed sport­ing enti­ties in the world. Acro­nis’ strate­gic and com­mer­cial sup­port rep­re­sents fur­ther affir­ma­tion of Air­speed­er and Alauda’s vision to accel­er­ate the next great mobil­i­ty rev­o­lu­tion through sport­ing com­pe­ti­tion.

Air­speed­er teams and pilots will ben­e­fit from real-time data includ­ing analy­sis of bat­tery and key sys­tems per­for­mance. From this infor­ma­tion, engi­neers will be able to define strat­e­gy in real time to find com­pet­i­tive advan­tage in a sport where every team starts with the same tech­ni­cal plat­form.

This part­ner­ship fol­lows the con­fir­ma­tion of major insti­tu­tion­al invest­ment in the sport and exist­ing sup­port from logis­tics giant DHL and glob­al mon­ey man­age­ment firm Equals.

Jan-Jaap Jager, Board Advi­sor and Senior Vice Pres­i­dent at Acro­nis, added: “Acro­nis’ place at the lead­ing edge of inno­va­tion in data man­age­ment per­fect­ly aligns with Alau­da and Airspeeder’s vision to accel­er­ate a mobil­i­ty rev­o­lu­tion through close sport­ing com­pe­ti­tion.

“Our proven, inte­grat­ed approach to pro­vid­ing easy, effi­cient, reli­able and secure cyber pro­tec­tion for all data, appli­ca­tions and sys­tems, will help Air­speed­er to enhance their per­for­mance on the air track and in the back office. We look for­ward to deliv­er­ing on the promise of a true next gen­er­a­tion tech­ni­cal and sport­ing propo­si­tion.”

Acro­nis’ cyber pro­tec­tion solu­tions, like its ful­ly-inte­grat­ed, AI-pow­ered anti-mal­ware and back­up solu­tion Acro­nis Cyber Pro­tect, are devel­oped based on the Five Vec­tors of Cyber Pro­tec­tion: Safe­ty, Acces­si­bil­i­ty, Pri­va­cy, Authen­tic­i­ty, and Secu­ri­ty (SAPAS).

This ensures that these solu­tions pro­vide the high­est cal­iber of pro­tec­tion for data, while also ensur­ing that said data is tam­per-free and eas­i­ly acces­si­ble for unob­struct­ed day-to-day oper­a­tions.

Air­speed­er is described by glob­al com­men­ta­tors as the ‘For­mu­la One of the skies’. It is the rac­ing series con­ceived by per­for­mance elec­tric fly­ing car mar­que, Alau­da, with elite pilots drawn from avi­a­tion, motor­sport and even eSports nav­i­gat­ing elec­tri­cal­ly gov­erned cours­es locat­ed across the world.

Elec­tric rac­ing mul­ti­copters cre­at­ed by Alau­da will fly at speeds of up to 130km/h, and Air­speed­er GP sea­sons will be con­test­ed by teams who will pur­chase the orig­i­nal craft and equip­ment from Alau­da, the Air­speed­er series’ exclu­sive man­u­fac­tur­er. They will also be giv­en free­dom to set race strat­e­gy and recruit pilots from a pool of elite pilot acad­e­my grad­u­ates.

Air­speed­er says this will cre­ate a tech­no­log­i­cal­ly even play­ing field, encour­ag­ing greater con­trol for teams to dic­tate strat­e­gy. This approach has been com­pared to the high­ly suc­cess­ful For­mu­la E rac­ing series.

Air­speed­ers will glob­al­ly stream races and inter­act with the sport’s fan com­mu­ni­ty across mul­ti­ple devices and chan­nels, Acro­nis’ work secure­ly man­ag­ing glob­al fan, fol­low­er and part­ner data for lead­ing sport­ing enti­ties per­fect­ly empow­ers Air­speed­er to deliv­er a next gen­er­a­tion mul­ti­me­dia expe­ri­ence.

Spec­ta­tors at live events will be lim­it­ed to VIPs exclu­sive­ly invit­ed to expe­ri­ence and ampli­fy the action from lux­u­ry pavil­ions.

As they com­pete, Speed­ers will utilise cut­ting-edge LiDAR and Machine Vision tech­nol­o­gy to ensure close but safe rac­ing, with defined and dig­i­tal­ly gov­erned no-fly areas sur­round­ing spec­ta­tors and offi­cials.

Acro­nis’ tech­ni­cal team will man­age the streams of live data that will under­pin a sport that promis­es to be the most excit­ing glob­al sport­ing and broad­cast enti­ty on the plan­et.

For more infor­ma­tion about Air­speed­er, vis­it https://airspeeder.com/

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Jason Pritchard

Jason Pritchard is the Editor of eVTOL Insights. He holds a BA from Leicester's De Montfort University and has worked in Journalism and Public Relations for more than a decade. Outside of work, Jason enjoys playing and watching football and golf. He also has a keen interest in Ancient Egypt.

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