Ever wondered how a university project can turn into something that powers a Ferrari? Earlier this year, The Manufacturer met Tim Wooler, Founder and CTO of YASA, whose PhD project on electric motors back in 2003 became the blueprint for a manufacturing success story.
What started as a curious student question: “Why aren’t there more electric cars?”, then blossomed into a revolutionary axial flux motor design. Unlike conventional motors, YASA’s motors are compact, lightweight and are punchy in performance. “I was tasked to go and find a subject I wanted to study and as an engineer, I was interested in why there were no electric cars. Beginning my research, I found that the batteries being used at the time only had a range of 60 miles and every vehicle that had been made back then, had failed or crashed,” he explained.
What started as notes in a lab notebook became a product that now delivers four times the torque of traditional motors and has found homes in the garages of some of the world’s most iconic car brands.
But the path from concept to production isn’t all smooth sailing. Scaling up from a prototype to 25,000 motors per year requires ingenuity and investment. Yet, with careful innovation, digitalisation and a focus on precision, YASA has turned academic curiosity into a growing business.
And Tim story isn’t the only one. Many engineering student projects take off and become products we know and use in our everyday lives. So for any students reading, don’t give up on your ideas. One day it could feature in The Manufacturer…
Read the full article from our Q3 edition, here.
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