KU Leuven students develop race car in cooperation with companies and reach third place finish in Hungary

Umicore Nova is the result of a cooperation between KU Leuven and Thomas More. With this race car, the students compete in the Formula Student competition; a series of international races uniting students from all over the world who compete each other with their own self-built race cars.

The students are judged on the performance of their race cars but just as much on their entrepreneurship and professionalism. For this, they have to give a business presentation among other things.

Last weekend, the Belgian Umicore Nova competed in Hungary against 40 different teams. The competition was fierce but the Belgian team managed an awe-inspiring third place finish.

© Formula Student Czech Republic s.r.o

The students designed and built the next generation race car for over nine months. The Umicore Nova is four wheel driven, weighs in at no more than 200 kg and gets from 0 to 100 km/h in just 2,6 seconds.

"We work together with a network of over 130 companies", Wannes Vanheisde student industrial engineering at KU Leuven and marketeer of the team mentions. "In order to reach this third place finish we had to emphasize the development and use of innovative technologies. This way, we link the academic world with the industry."

The Hugary race was the third and last race of the season. The Umicore Nova team are already looking forward to outperform their third place finish next year.