United Kingdom: McLaren Racing, a British motor racing team and the UK Defence Ministry are teaming up for a coalition on high-tech innovative projects.
McLaren Racing’s state-of-the-art accelerator team operates knowledge and expertise from elite-level motorsport to produce state-of-the-art technology and manufacturing. The new cooperation will help the Ministry of Defence (MOD) learn these from the Accelerator team.
The collaboration aims to work together to find new solutions to a variety of defence projects. The upcoming projects may include the electrification of new military vehicles and forthcoming energy prospects for the armed forces, which will raise their functioning effectiveness.
Grant Shapps, the UK Defence Secretary said that, “This exciting partnership will see McLaren Racing bring their world-class expertise from the racetrack into a number of defence projects. By collaborating with industry we will continue to drive innovation through knowledge sharing, which will benefit Defence’s engineering and operations across the course of the partnership and beyond.”
The armoured vehicle electrification, ‘Project LURCHER’, is one of the projects that could benefit from this partnership. The project aims to achieve the Army’s goal of transitioning to electric vehicle technology. To mark the launch of the alliance, the NEOM McLaren Extreme E race car was displayed alongside the Project Lurcher vehicle at Battle Lab, a Dorset-based defence innovation co-creation space.
Electrification may produce military vehicles more operational, decrease the demand for resupply from new energy sources, and therefore lower the susceptibility to forces in the field. The technological invention will also help in raising the range of vehicles.
Matt Dennington, Co-Chief Commercial Officer of McLaren Racing, stated that, “This new partnership with the Ministry of Defence provides a great opportunity to stretch and apply our innovation and technological know-how and a high-performance culture with a view to improving operational efficiencies across a wide range of exciting projects. Under the multi-year partnership, the Ministry of Defence will collaborate through McLaren Accelerator to apply motorsport innovation and insights to projects that are jointly selected by Defence and McLaren teams.”