Students
Shape the Future of the Automotive Innovation
EcoCAR provides students with hands-on experience applying classroom knowledge to real-world vehicle engineering challenges while gaining hands-on experience, technical expertise, leadership skills, and professional mentorship that prepares them for successful careers in advanced mobility.
Why Compete in EcoCAR?
Go beyond the classroom by solving real engineering challenges, collaborating with industry experts, and building the technical expertise and leadership experience to enter the workforce ready to contribute on day one
Engineer the Future of Mobility
Work on real vehicle platforms while solving next-generation mobility challenges in connected and automated vehicles, electrification, artificial intelligence, and advanced propulsion. EcoCAR gives students the opportunity to apply engineering principles to technologies that are shaping the future of the automotive industry.
Learn Alongside Industry
Throughout the four-year EcoCAR Innovation Challenge, participants receive more than 1,000 hours of sponsor-led technical training and complete over 500 hours of vehicle testing, creating an immersive learning environment that bridges academic knowledge with real-world engineering practice.Through mentorship, technical reviews, and professional training, students gain insight into industry expectations while building meaningful professional relationships.
Gain Experience with Professional Tools & Technologies
Develop hands-on experience using the same software, hardware, engineering workflows, and testing methodologies used throughout the automotive industry. Students work with advanced vehicle platforms, AI-enabled engineering tools, simulation environments, and emerging technologies while receiving technical support from industry experts.
Become a Leader
EcoCAR challenges students to think beyond engineering by developing leadership, communication, project management, and systems-thinking skills. Working within multidisciplinary teams prepares participants to lead complex technical projects and thrive in collaborative professional environments.
Turn Innovation into Impact
Transform ideas into real-world solutions by designing, validating, and presenting innovative technologies throughout the four-year competition. Students produce professional engineering deliverables, technical presentations, publications, and product concepts while contributing to technologies with real industry applications.
92%
$12.5k Salary Premium
#1
Gain Real-World Experience Beyond the Classroom
Join EcoCAR to work on real vehicles, collaborate with leading automotive companies, build lifelong professional connections, and develop the technical and leadership skills that employers value while helping shape the future of mobility before you graduate.
Explore the EcoCAR Subteams
Students participating in the EcoCAR Innovation Challenge can expect to develop a broad array of skills and competencies that will prepare them for their future career. Students will develop expertise in advanced vehicle technologies, proficiency with industry-standard tools and software, and specialized competencies in automotive systems such as vehicle design, energy systems, and software integration.
Cross-Track Functions & Activities
Marketing Communications (MarCom)
What Do Students Work On?
Communications Activities will focus on defining and promoting the team’s brand and voice. This includes creating a strong visual identity, managing social media and digital content, producing multimedia assets, and building relationships with campus and community partners. Students will also plan and execute events, design promotional materials, and ensure consistent, effective messaging across all platforms.
What's the Importance?
The Marketing & Communications function is a strategic component of the EcoCAR Innovation Challenge that enables teams to build a professional brand, communicate complex engineering innovations, engage key stakeholders, recognize sponsor contributions, recruit future team members, and amplify the impact of their technical achievements. Through integrated communications and product marketing activities, students gain industry-relevant experience while ensuring their team's work reaches audiences far beyond the competition.
Skills Gained
- Strategic Communications Planning
- Brand Development & Management
- Content Creation & Storytelling
- Digital Marketing
- Social Media Management
- Graphic Design
- Video Production & Multimedia Editing
- Public Relations & Media Communications
- Event Planning & Community Outreach
- Project Management & Cross-Functional Collaboration
- Marketing Analytics & Performance Measurement
Majors
- Communications
- Public Relations
- Marketing
- Organizational Communication
- Visual Communications
- Journalism
Careers
- Communications Specialist
- Social Media Manager
- Community Manager
- Digital Marketing Specialist
Project Management (PM)
What is it?
Connects people, plans, risks, resources and decisions to turn EcoCAR’s multi-year goals into coordinated team execution
What Do Students Work On?
In Year 1, students establish team roles and operating practices, build an integrated workplan, engage university stakeholders and complete status/assurance reviews. Throughout EIC, they coordinate schedules, risks, changes, resources and cross-swimlane dependencies.
What's the Importance?
Keeps technical and product work aligned, identifies risks early and provides the planning and evidence needed to move confidently through the Vehicle Development Process.
Skills Gained
- Project Planning
- Team Leadership and Facilitation
- Risk Management
- Cross-Functional Coordination
- Executive Communication
Majors
- Engineering Management
- Business/Management
- Industrial Engineering
- Communications or Related Fields
Careers
- Project Manager
- Program Manager
- Engineering Project Lead
- Product Manager
- Operations Lead
Product Innovation Track (PIT)
What is it?
The Product Innovation Track (PIT) exposes all 20 university teams to innovation methods and entrepreneurial frameworks as they develop innovative products, processes, or methodologies that directly support their vehicle development. Students will explore deep-tech and R&D approaches by starting with vehicle-relevant technologies and conducting rigorous customer discovery to define exact applications and requirements before building. Teams will utilize processes, such as capturing the "Voice of Customer," application discovery, and requirements validation, guiding their innovations from concept toward potential commercialization. Ultimately, the primary focus of this track is the development of the students themselves; it aims to shape "stakeholder-aware engineers" who understand how to balance complex technical trade-offs with business value and real-world integration roadblocks.
What Do Students Work On?
Students participate in a dual-track system balancing structured methodology with creative discovery:
Studios (Controlled Exploration): In a bounded setting, students learn and practice the mechanics of venture creation. Year 1 activities include deconstructing business models to form initial wedge hypotheses, activating outreach pipelines, conducting customer discovery interviews, and synthesizing evidence for venture viability.
Open Exploration: This breadth discovery layer runs alongside the bounded Studio Challenges. Year 1 activities focus on team identity formation, network mapping, and building a living virtual portfolio of up to 10 candidate problem spaces. The year culminates in the Innovation Expo, an at-competition showcase where teams present their exploration journey, lessons learned, and brand identity in a visual, interactive format.
What's the Importance?
The Product Innovation Track bridges the gap between advanced vehicle engineering and market viability. By rigorously testing desirability, feasibility, and viability, PIT ensures that the technological solutions developed in EcoCAR are not just innovative in the lab, but hold true commercial value and solve validated customer pain points in the real world. It cultivates an entrepreneurial mindset, preparing students to be commercial leaders in the mobility industry.
Skills Gained
- Customer Discovery & Interviewing: Mastering unbiased conversation protocols to uncover latent customer needs and pain points.
- Business Model Development: Mapping core business mechanics and tracking evolving assumptions via the Business Model Canvas.
- Hypothesis Formulation & Testing: Structuring falsifiable tests across desirability, feasibility, and viability.
- Market Sizing & Analysis: Calculating TAM, SAM, and SOM through bottom-up, value-pool sizing methodologies.
- Pitching & Visual Communication: Synthesizing complex discovery data into compelling journey narratives and interactive displays.
Majors
- Business Administration & Management
- Entrepreneurship & Innovation
- Marketing & Communications
- Product Design / Human-Computer Interaction (HCI)
- Engineering (Systems, Product, or Industrial)
Careers
- Product Manager
- Startup Founder / Entrepreneur
- Innovation Strategist
- Technology Commercialization Lead
- Business Development Manager
General Motors Swimlanes
GM Track Vehicle Systems Engineering (VSE)
What is it?
Vehicle Systems Engineering provides the technical foundation for the entire vehicle development effort. Students learn to translate customer needs into engineering requirements, evaluate competing design concepts, and make objective, data-driven engineering decisions. The swimlane emphasizes systems thinking, traceability, and informed decision making throughout the vehicle lifecycle.
What Do Students Work On?
Students establish engineering requirements, evaluate multiple propulsion architectures, perform trade studies, and use modeling and simulation to support design decisions. During Year 1, they complete the Architecture Selection process, conduct Preliminary Hazard Analysis activities, characterize the stock vehicle, and develop the systems engineering artifacts that guide future vehicle development.
What's the Importance?
Nearly every engineering decision made during EcoCAR depends on sound systems engineering. Selecting the right architecture early reduces technical risk and establishes the roadmap for controls, hardware integration, manufacturing, and testing. This swimlane ensures the vehicle is designed as a complete system rather than a collection of individual components.
Skills Gained
- Systems Engineering
- Requirements Management
- Engineering Trade Studies
- Vehicle Modeling & Simulation
- Technical Decision Making
Majors
- Mechanical Engineering
- Electrical Engineering
- Systems Engineering
- Automotive Engineering
- Computer Engineering
Careers
- Systems Engineer
- Vehicle Integration Engineer
- Systems Architecture Engineer
- Technical Program Engineer
- Vehicle Development Engineer
GM Track Vehicle Hardware Integration (VHI)
What is it?
Vehicle Hardware & Integration focuses on transforming engineering concepts into physical vehicle systems. Students learn how to package, design, document, and safely integrate hardware while preparing for future vehicle modifications. The swimlane emphasizes practical engineering and real-world implementation.
What Do Students Work On?
During Year 1, students establish CAD management processes, develop a concept Front High Voltage Junction Box, prepare facilities and safety documentation, and perform baseline vehicle testing. They also create engineering drawings, bills of materials, and design documentation that support future vehicle integration.
What's the Importance?
Successful vehicle development depends on disciplined hardware integration and engineering documentation. Students develop the processes needed to safely design, manufacture, and integrate future vehicle systems while reducing project risk before major modifications begin.
Skills Gained
- CAD Modeling
- Mechanical Design
- Packaging Engineering
- High-Voltage Safety
- Design Documentation
Majors
- Mechanical Engineering
- Electrical Engineering
- Manufacturing Engineering
- Automotive Engineering
- Mechatronics Engineering
Careers
- Vehicle Integration Engineer
- Mechanical Design Engineer
- Product Development Engineer
- Packaging Engineer
- Manufacturing Engineer
GM Track Propulsion Controls and Modeling (PCM)
What is it?
The Propulsion Controls and Modeling (PCM) subteam is responsible for the design, development, integration, and testing of the vehicle's longitudinal propulsion controls. The team uses software development and modeling techniques to build a control system optimized for both performance and energy efficiency.
What Do Students Work On?
Students work in MATLAB/Simulink to design propulsion control algorithms and define how they interface with the rest of the vehicle. They validate their designs through model-in-the-loop and hardware-in-the-loop testing before progressing to full vehicle testing to evaluate real-world performance.
What's the Importance?
Propulsion controls governs every device that puts torque to the wheels, making it central to vehicle operation. Beyond designing a system that drives the vehicle efficiently, the PCM team establishes the interfaces that let systems other than the driver — such as CAVs (connected/autonomous vehicle systems) — command torque.
Skills Gained
- MATLAB/Simulink
- Torque Control and Driveability Software Development
- Robust Diagnostic Software Design
- Simulation-Based Testing
- Vehicle-Based Testing
- Data Processing
Majors
- Mechanical Engineering
- Electrical Engineering
- Computer Science
- Computer Engineering
Careers
- Controls Engineer
- Software Engineer
- Calibration Engineer
- Test Engineer
- Modeling and Simulation Engineer
GM Track Connected and Automated Vehicle (CAV)
What is it?
The Connected and Automated Vehicle (CAV) swimlane focuses on designing, building, and deploying automated driving features. These features incorporate Vehicle-to-Everything (V2X) connectivity to enable more energy efficient vehicle performance. Through participating in this swimlane students learn about autonomous system design and development as well as software development best practices.
What Do Students Work On?
Students in the CAV swimlane work on designing the hardware and software architectures of their CAV system, developing perception, energy efficient controls, and path planning algorithms, and testing and refining their feature set both in simulation and on vehicle in preparation for track-based evaluations during Tech Week.
In Year 1, students will build the foundation for their CAV system by establishing their development and simulation toolchain, designing their initial CAV architecture, and beginning software development with a primary focus on perception stack development and initial Adaptive Cruise Control (ACC) and lane centering development.
What's the Importance?
Connected and Automated Vehicles have the capability to vastly improve the efficiency of transportation, reduce congestion, and eliminate accidents caused by human error. The CAV swimlane is essential to the vehicle development process because it enables students to design, integrate, test, and validate intelligent vehicle features that improve safety, efficiency, and connectivity.
Skills Gained
- Software Development
- Autonomous Controls Development
- Sensor Data Processing
- Version Control
- Autonomous Vehicle Simulation
Majors
- Computer Science
- Computer Engineering
- Electrical Engineering
- Mechanical Engineering
Careers
- Software Engineer
- Controls Engineer
- Data Scientist
- Computer Vision Engineer
- Robotics Engineer
Stellantis Swimlanes
STLA Track Vehicle Systems Engineering (VSE)
What is it?
Vehicle Systems Engineering guides the development of the Stellantis vehicle from concept through integration by applying a structured, requirements-driven engineering process. Students evaluate complete vehicle architectures while balancing performance, capability, safety, and project execution constraints. The swimlane highlights how complex engineering decisions are made in industry.
What Do Students Work On?
Students analyze vehicle requirements, perform trade studies, evaluate battery and propulsion architectures, and support integrated vehicle architecture selection. During Year 1, they characterize the stock vehicle, develop architecture proposals, evaluate battery configuration options, and defend their engineering decisions during formal design reviews.
What's the Importance?
The Stellantis track requires students to optimize an electrified vehicle while preserving its intended capability and functionality. Systems engineering enables teams to make balanced decisions that consider performance, manufacturability, safety, cost, and vehicle integration throughout development.
Skills Gained
- Systems Engineering
- Vehicle Architecture Development
- Battery Systems Analysis
- Engineering Trade Studies
- Technical Communication
Majors
- Mechanical Engineering
- Electrical Engineering
- Systems Engineering
- Automotive Engineering
- Computer Engineering
Careers
- Systems Engineer
- Battery Systems Engineer
- Vehicle Development Engineer
- Vehicle Architecture Engineer
- Electrification Engineer
STLA Track Vehicle Hardware Integration (VHI)
What is it?
Vehicle Hardware & Integration prepares students to design, package, and eventually integrate advanced electrified vehicle hardware. The swimlane combines practical engineering, laboratory work, and design documentation to support future vehicle modifications. Students learn how engineering concepts become reliable vehicle hardware.
What Do Students Work On?
During Year 1, students perform baseline vehicle testing, evaluate battery module configurations, establish engineering documentation, complete CAD packaging studies, and prepare facilities for future integration activities. These activities provide the technical foundation for battery assembly and vehicle integration in later competition years.
What's the Importance?
Hardware integration connects engineering analysis with real vehicle implementation. By collecting baseline data and developing preliminary hardware concepts before major modifications begin, teams reduce technical risk and establish a strong foundation for successful integration during future years of the competition.
Skills Gained
- Vehicle Testing CAD and Packaging
- Battery Integration Fundamentals
- Engineering Documentation
- Data Acquisition and Analysis
Majors
- Mechanical Engineering
- Electrical Engineering
- Automotive Engineering
- Mechatronics Engineering
- Manufacturing Engineering
Careers
- Vehicle Integration Engineer
- Battery Integration Engineer
- Test Engineer
- Product Development Engineer
- Manufacturing Engineer
STLA Track Propulsion Controls and Modeling (PCM)
What is it?
The Propulsion Controls and Modeling (PCM) swimlane is responsible for the design, development, integration, and testing of the vehicle's longitudinal propulsion controls. The team uses software development and modeling techniques to build a control system optimized for both performance and energy efficiency.
What Do Students Work On?
Students work in MATLAB/Simulink to design propulsion control algorithms and define how they interface with the rest of the vehicle. They validate their designs through model-in-the-loop and hardware-in-the-loop testing before progressing to full vehicle testing to evaluate real-world performance.
What's the Importance?
Propulsion controls governs every device that puts torque to the wheels, making it central to vehicle operation. Beyond designing a system that drives the vehicle efficiently, the PCM team establishes the interfaces that let systems other than the driver — such as CAVs (connected/autonomous vehicle systems) — command torque.
Skills Gained
- MATLAB/Simulink
- Torque Control and Driveability Software Development
- Robust Diagnostic Software Design
- Simulation-Based Testing
- Vehicle-Based Testing
- Data Processing
Majors
- Mechanical Engineering
- Electrical Engineering
- Computer Science
- Computer Engineering
Careers
- Controls Engineer (Not Just Automotive — Controls Is Everywhere)
- Software Engineer
- Calibration Engineer
- Test Engineer
- Modeling and Simulation Engineer
STLA Track High Voltage Battery (HVB)
What is it?
The High Voltage Battery (HVB) swimlane challenges students to design, analyze, and ultimately build a custom battery pack specifically to power the team-added rear electric drive unit (EDU) in the Stellantis vehicle. Students evaluate module configurations and pack architectures to meet strict electrical, safety, and packaging requirements. The swimlane bridges high-voltage systems integration and real-world automotive engineering, requiring students to think simultaneously about performance, safety, weight, and cost. This swimlane is hands-on and technically demanding, culminating in a team-built, vehicle-integrated battery system utilizing program-provided modules.
What Do Students Work On?
In Year 1, students characterize the stock HV battery system, calculate combined powertrain power demands from the stock front motor and team-added rear electric drive unit, and evaluate whether the stock battery can support the new drivetrain during Years 1 and 2. They construct a pack configuration matrix comparing cell types and Series×Parallel (SxP) arrangements against competition constraints, and present a preliminary battery architecture during the Integrated Vehicle Architecture Selection review. In later years, students design and assemble battery modules, integrate supporting components (BDU, BMS, sense circuitry, etc.), and ultimately install and validate a team-built pack in the vehicle.
What's the Importance?
The HV battery is the energy foundation of the entire electrified drivetrain — without it, the rear EDU cannot function and the vehicle cannot compete. Students learn how OEM battery engineers balance competing constraints: voltage, energy, power, thermal, and packaging constraints simultaneously, reinforcing the systems engineering mindset central to EcoCAR.
Skills Gained
- Battery Systems Engineering
- High-Voltage Electrical Design
- Cell and Pack-Level Analysis
- Thermal and Electrical Simulation
- Engineering Trade Studies and Design Documentation
Majors
- Electrical Engineering
- Mechanical Engineering
- Automotive Engineering
- Systems Engineering
- Mechatronics Engineering
Careers
- Battery Systems Engineer
- HV Integration Engineer
- Electrification Engineer
- Battery Pack Design Engineer
- Automotive Power Electronics Engineer
Interested in Joining EcoCAR?
Complete the form below to learn more about participating in the EcoCAR Innovation Challenge or getting involved with your university’s team.
