TIER IV released an Autoware racing-kart reference design used by 240 teams

TIER IV said on September 24 that it had developed a reference design for autonomous racing kart systems and released its software and design information in a public GitHub repository. The design is built on Autoware, the open-source autonomous driving software the company originated.

It was used as the common development platform in the Autonomous Driving AI Challenge organized by the Society of Automotive Engineers of Japan, which ran from July to September 2026. TIER IV said 240 teams comprising approximately 600 participants used it through the qualifying and final rounds. The finals, held on September 19 and 20, featured racing karts in both simulation-based and real-world vehicle challenges.

The release has four parts. The vehicle and hardware configuration specifies a TOM’S electric racing kart, a global navigation satellite system receiver, an inertial measurement unit and an onboard computer. The autonomous driving software is open-source and built on Autoware. A publicly available simulator reproduces racing kart driving, paired with an online environment for evaluating submitted software during the competition. A web platform supports software setup and execution and the review of driving results.

The company put the reasoning in terms of cost of entry. Integrating vehicles, sensors, onboard computers and software into a system that works in the real world takes evaluation environments as well as development ones, it said, and building those from scratch places a significant burden on developers entering the field, creating barriers to technology development and to training engineers.