AT&T Williams - Driving Business

In January 2007 AT&T commenced their title sponsorship of the AT&T Williams team and simultaneously undertook an ambitious project with the company behind the team, Williams F1, to revolutionise their infrastructure and provide cutting-edge services to help give a technological advantage.

If considered purely on the basis of scale, Williams F1 might be a small- to mediumsized enterprise compared with many global companies today. However the industry in which the company operates, Formula One, is unique, and it represents one of the most challenging, time-pressured and increasingly global environments, in which being at the forefront of technology and communication is vital for success.

Harnessing Real Value

The introduction of AT&T's Internet Protocol (iP) virtual private network (VPN) service marked the start of this joint initiative in early 2007 and enabled Williams F1 to fundamentally change the way they operate. martin silman, Executive director responsible for Global Portfolio management, spearheads the technological partnership from within AT&T. "The service previously available to Williams F1 meant that the company employed a segmented operation with activities at their headquarters and trackside being completely discrete, with no overlap - but AT&T's EVPN service has successfully consolidated the company's infrastructure."

During the 2007 FiA Formula One season, this integrated VPn service allowed the AT&T Williams racing division within Williams F1 to place more emphasis on the role of telemetry over a race weekend and explore new ways to utilise this.

Optimising Technology for the Season Ahead

Once the Formula One season commences in march each year, the team is restricted on the amount of car running time, so the optimal time to develop the car is during the 7-week pre-season testing period.

during pre-season testing the three main goals are firstly to assess reliability and address any issues that the team may have with the new car, secondly to evaluate performance levels and identify areas that could be improved, and thirdly, to give direction for future chassis development.

Rod nelson, Chief Operations Engineer at Williams F1, is an end-user of AT&T's services and explains the broader benefits that this technology affords.

AT&T's VPN service is fully optimised during this period, because the improved rate of data transfer directly correlates to an increased rate of development of the components for the cars. For example, in the UK headquarters we have aerodynamists viewing the telemetry transferred back from the car during preseason testing. This allows us to efficiently perform aerodynamic analysis whereby we correlate the ontrack performance of the car with the data generated from the windtunnel. if there is a discrepancy, we can locate the cause faster than previously and therefore rectify it in a much shorter timeframe.

Benefits throughout the company

It's not just the AT&T Williams race team that benefit from the new infrastructure. The improvements from the affiliation with AT&T have been felt company-wide. As one of the most successful teams in the history of Formula One, AT&T Williams has a large fan base across the world, and the website is a primary method of communicating with the fans.