Canopy Simulations join the dots for Britain’s challenge to win the America’s Cup

INEOS TEAM UK are delighted to announce that they have been working with dynamic optimization experts Canopy Simulations for the 36th America’s Cup campaign.

Canopy already provide simulations to the top echelons of motorsport, counting among their clients Formula 1 teams, the majority of Formula E teams, automotive OEMs, and regulatory bodies. The application to the America’s Cup world might seem unusual, however Canopy’s core technology is not specific to any particular vehicle or system. In fact, it finds the optimal dynamic control of cars, planes, oilfields, batch reactors, investment portfolios and now racing yachts.

Simulation is fundamental to the way modern America’s Cup boats are developed, especially the new class of boat for the 36th America’s Cup ‘The AC75’ which has never been built before. The ability to predict the ultimate performance of a design, including its true performance in dynamic manoeuvres, without having to physically build anything means that thousands of design iterations can be tried and tested before any carbon is laid in the boat building process.

Mark Catherall, from Canopy commented on the partnership “Working with INEOS TEAM UK is not only an interesting and challenging project, but it’s also a great way to demonstrate the applicability of our core technology to systems in sport other than racing cars. It’s inspiring for us to work with such a motivated team on such an open problem – no-one has ever built a boat like this before, there’s a lot of performance gains up for grabs and simulation is key”.

Nick Holroyd, INEOS TEAM UK’s Chief Designer added, “The partnership with Canopy Simulations has given us big gains in the design process. We use their personalised simulation system to look at how different foils, rudders, and system design interactions impact the performance of the boat, which has meant we’ve quickly learnt how to sail the boat in the most efficient way – all whilst staying on dry land.”