On March 13, 2004, the first DARPA Grand Challenge took place in the Mojave desert. 15 participating teams had been selected from 25 entrants during the Qualification Inspection Demonstration (QID) event the week before at the Fontana Speedway race track.

Among these, SciAutonics was the only company to sponsor two teams that had qualified to participate in this event: SciAutonics-1 and SciAutonics-2 (Elbit-SciAutonics). The SciAutonics-1 team featured the vehicle RASCAL, the SciAutonics-2 team sent the vehicle AVIDOR-2004 into the competition.

2004 Participants

What would DARPA's Grand Challenge race be without our fellow participants and competitors? The Grand Challenge has generated much interest on the part of many companies and independent parties, all willing to put forth a great deal of effort, time, and money in order to take autonomous ground vehicles to the next level - a true "soap box" derby for the 21st century!

Out of over 100 original applicants, we were very excited to be among the fifteen teams selected to participate in the 2004 DARPA Grand Challenge Field Test. Any of these teams will compete again in the next Grand Challenge. We look forward to even more great teams joining us in the Grand Challenge 2005!

Team Name
Start Number
Hometown

Team CajunBot
2
Lafayette, LA

Team Cimar
4
Gainesville, FL and Logan, UT

Team CalTech
5
Pasadena, CA

Digital Auto Drive (DAD)
7
Morgan Hill, CA

The Golem Group
9
Santa Monica, CA

Palos Verdes High School
Road Warriors
10
Palos Verdes Estates, CA

Team ENSCO
13
Falls Church, VA

Team TerraHawk
15
Gardena, CA

The Blue Team
16
Berkeley, CA

SciAutonics-1
17
Thousand Oaks, CA

Team TerraMax
20
Oshkosh, WI

SciAutonics-2 (Elbit and SciAutonics)
21
Thousand Oaks, CA

Red Team
22
Pittsburgh, PA

Axion Racing
23
Westlake Village, CA

Virginia Tech
25
Blacksburg, VA