History
While ASE was founded in 2024, it has a much richer history, dating back to 2019. Before the bachelor's project was launched, the founding team has been competing in the NXP cup which inspired the launch of ASE.
Founding Team
Dr. Natalia Silvis-Cividjian
Supervisor and project organizer
Natalia is the driving force behind ASE and the VU's participation in the NXP cup. Since 2019, she selects motivated and skilled students who are then trained to compete during her Bachelor's course "Project Autonomous Driving". Generations of students have been motivated to race by Natalia's teaching in autonomous driving and computer vision.
In 2023, Natalia sketched out the initial ideas for the ASE bachelor project (originally called BPAD: "Bachelor Project Autonomous Driving"). Since then, she has supervised the development and setup of ASE, and has been the primary supervisor since its launch.
Niels Althuisius
Electronical engineer and project support
Side by side with Natalia, Niels is part of the NXP cup and ASE team since the start. As part of his work for the Beta Electronics ("elebeta") labs at the VU, he has played a vital role in the VU's participation in the NXP cup by debugging and extending the provided NXP car kit electronics.
When ASE was launched, Niels has been responsible for designing and producing the main electronics of all ASE Rovers. He has designed the power distribution board (PDB) and printed circuit board (PCB) and tested and assembled all components. As part of the ASE/Alpha-One team, he became a champion in 2024's NXP cup in Hamburg. The core team sleeps better at night knowing that Niels' wisdom approved their project ideas.
Elias Groot
Software lead and daily organizer
Being selected by Natalia in 2020, Elias has a long history of competing in the NXP cup. He participated in 2021, 2022 and 2023 in different team formations. In 2024 he participated one more time, leading the software design and development of the new ASE Rovers and taking home the first place as part of the ASE/Alpha team.
Together with Natalia and Max, Elias has designed and shaped the ASE project since its early beginnings. Together with Eduardo, much of his efforts have been centered around building robust, reliable and extendable software that new students can conveniently research and race with. Elias has been a daily supervisor in 2024 and 2025, where he also trained a new generation of teaching assistants to run the project. He now supports new participants in the NXP cup.
Max Gallup
Hardware lead and daily organizer
Max first participated in the NXP cup in 2023, joining Elias' team. He immediately brought a fresh and opinionated approach towards hardware engineering and improved the existing hardware setup. In 2024 he led the hardware design and development of the new ASE Rovers and obtained the first place in the NXP cup, as part of the ASE/Alpha team.
Together with Natalia and Elias, Max has been a key player in the design and execution of the ASE project since its early days. Working together with Niels and Hugo, he determined the direction for the hardware and has been in charge of testing, producing and assembling all Rovers. Max has been a daily supervisor in 2024 and 2025, where he also trained a new generation of teaching assistants to run the project.
Hugo van Wezenbeek
Hardware design and development
Having competed in the NXP cup since 2019 after being selected by Natalia, no-one at the founding team has more experience with the NXP cup than Hugo. He participated in 2021, 2022 and 2023 in different team formations. In 2024 he participated one more time, designing and producing the hardware of the new ASE Rovers and taking home the first place as part of the ASE/One team.
His sharp eye for detail and thorough engineering practices make Hugo an unmissable part of the founding team of ASE. Together with Max, he has designed and developed the ASE Rovers and has assisted Max and Elias in the project organization in 2024 and 2025. He provided the build guide and hardware documentation for future maintainers.
Eduardo Lira
Software design and development
Competing in the NXP cup since 2021, Eduardo has never missed a race. Since then, he competed in the cup in 2022 and 2023 in different team formations. In 2024 he participated one more time, designing and developing the software of the new ASE Rovers and taking home the first place as part of the ASE/One team.
With a strong background in software engineering in the field of autonomous driving, Eduardo has played a key role in the launch of the ASE project. Together with Elias he sketched out the new ASE framework and its service-oriented design. He has assisted Max and Elias in the organization and setup of the ASE project in 2024 and has pioneered the development of a simulator to analyze race performance.
Joshua Kenyon
Second reader and project support
Assisting Natalia, Joshua has been part of ASE since year one. His own thesis centered around autonomous driving in challenging illumination conditions, and he now shares that knowledge as a second reader for theses written at ASE.
Launch
After an unsatisfiable result in 2023's NXP cup, the founding team got inspired to redesign the autonomous race cars from the ground up. Until then, they had raced with pre-built car kits provided by NXP, which did not allow for the level of performance the team was determined to unlock.
The plan was twofold: develop 20 new custom cars that are extendible and user-friendly so that students can use them for autonomous systems engineering research, fast enough so that they could also be used to compete in the NXP cup for the years to come. ASE was born!
Hardware, electronics and software were all designed and developed in house - with great support from the VU's electronics and fine-mechanical labs. By the end of 2023, the new ASE/Rover and its composable software framework started to take shape.
Due to close co-design of the Rover hardware and software, the new Rover unlocked fine-grained motor and steering control. Custom ESC software enabled powerful acceleration and active braking, based on Field-Oriented Control.
The first Rovers were assembled in March 2024, right before the launch of the ASE project in April that year. The founding team has worked the entire year to improve hardware and software based on feedback from the first generation of ASE students.
Race
To prove the capabilities of the new Rover, the ASE founding team used it to participate in the 2024 NXP cup. After qualifying first place in Eindhoven, they took the train to Hamburg to represent the VU in the NXP cup finals there.
The NXP headquarters in Hamburg posed the perfect scene for an exciting race. The ASE/Alpha-One team proved the fastest, outperforming the second place by more than two seconds. After competing since 2019, this hard-fought victory finally brought home the first place to Amsterdam!
Education
After first year's run of the ASE project in 2024, Max and Elias have again led its daily organization in 2025 under supervision of Natalia. Several improvements have been made to the framework to interface with virtually any programming language. The website and documentation have been extended and ASE launched with 19 students and 6 domain experts.
While Eduardo and Hugo unfortunately left the ASE-team in 2025, three new team members joined: Darian Janevski, Niels Dijkstra and Leonid Ivanov. They were trained and supervised by Max and Elias to take over ASE for the years to come.