15 May 2020
Press release

Acronis and Toyota Gazoo Racing WEC Team Announced Official AI Partnership

SCHAFFHAUSEN, Switzerland. Acronis, a global leader in cyber protection, today announced a new technology partnership with Toyota Gazoo Racing WEC Team, becoming its Official Artificial Intelligence Partner. Acronis will design AI/ML solutions to assist the team's performance both on and off the racetrack.

The name Toyota is synonymous with motorsport and with endurance racing. It's a field where the famous Japanese marque has excelled in recent years, claiming the prestigious World Endurance Championship (WEC) in 2014 with Anthony Davidson and Sebastien Buemi at the wheel and more recently in 2018/19, when Buemi again was triumphantly partnered by Fernando Alonso and home hero Kazuki Nakajima.

Unquestionably one of the most prestigious of motorsport championships, the WEC races on some of the most iconic circuits around the globe, including Silverstone, Fuji, Sebring, Spa-Francorchamps and, of course, the 24 Hours of Le Mans. It was at this most iconic of venues where Toyota have won on the last two occasions and will be looking for a hat-trick of titles this year in the TS050 Hybrid.

Toyota Gazoo Racing will use Acronis' expertise in machine learning and artificial intelligence to process large amounts of racing data for the development of cars. Acronis will also assist with the analysis of the wind tunnel data, accelerating aerodynamics projects across the team's race car lineup.

Acronis AI/ML innovations are driven by a team of AI experts who are also engaged in developing advanced cyber protection/ technology capable of protecting all workloads and defending cyberattacks. Acronis helps partners and customers worldwide to address the safety, accessibility, privacy, authenticity, and security (SAPAS) of workloads. During the COVID-19 outbreak, Acronis also helps its partners to secure remote workloads and stay #CyberFit.

"We're thrilled to welcome Acronis to Toyota Gazoo Racing in WEC. In motorsport, performance is everything and our partnership with Acronis will introduce AI/ML solutions that will enhance our team's development of our racecars, giving us the competitive edge we have been looking for. We're looking forward to a successful year with Acronis," said Rob Leupen, Managing Director of Toyota Gazoo Racing Europe.

"Acronis continues to set the #CyberFit standard. Our technology is perfectly suited for helping motorsport teams protect their data, applications and systems in any environment, enhanced by the latest AI and ML developments. We are proud to become an official team partner of Toyota Gazoo Racing and look forward to a successful partnership with the team," said Serg Bell, Acronis Founder and CEO.

Acronis partners with a number of sports and motorsport teams worldwide. For more information, please visit https://acronis.sport

About Toyota Gazoo Racing Europe

Toyota Gazoo Racing Europe has been based in Cologne, Germany since 1979 and has built its reputation in motorsport, originally as Andersson Motorsport then later as TOYOTA Motorsport GmbH.

Its competitive origins began with two decades of FIA World Rally Championship success, while the company's facilities and capabilities expanded significantly during its time in Formula 1 (2002-2009). Since the end of that era, TOYOTA GAZOO Racing Europe has combined works motorsport participation in the FIA World Endurance Championship with research and development support for TOYOTA Motor Corporation and a thriving business as a supplier of high-performance services to the automotive and motorsport sectors. Additionally, a growing customer motorsport business has developed covering activities in rally and circuit racing. www.tgr-europe.com

About Acronis:

Acronis is a global cyber protection company that provides natively integrated cybersecurity, data protection, and endpoint management for managed service providers (MSPs), small and medium businesses (SMBs), and enterprise IT departments. Acronis solutions are highly efficient and designed to identify, prevent, detect, respond, remediate, and recover from modern cyberthreats with minimal downtime, ensuring data integrity and business continuity. Acronis offers the most comprehensive security solution on the market for MSPs with its unique ability to meet the needs of diverse and distributed IT environments.

A Swiss company founded in Singapore in 2003, Acronis has 45 locations across the globe. Acronis Cyber Protect is available in 26 languages in 150 countries and is used by over 20,000 service providers to protect over 750,000 businesses. Learn more at www.acronis.com.
Press contacts:
Katya Turtseva
VP of Communications