August 24, 2018—FutureTech Auto, an automotive aftermarket distributor of vehicle electrification training products, tools and support solutions, announced it is offering automotive software and electronics boot camps.
The boot camps will take place in Las Vegas and Portland, Ore., training sites between December 2018 and 2020.
After quickly selling out the five-day Automotive Software & Electronics pilot course this summer, FutureTech is responding to market demand for this training with Hands-On Boot Camps supporting Fundamental, Intermediate, and Advanced Levels. Each five-day boot camp is all hands-on projects with instructor lecture blended into the activities. The skills learned can be applied to electrified vehicle systems such as the Tesla Model S, Chevrolet Volt, and Toyota Prius to name a few.
FutureTech’s hands-on boot camps address an immediate need within the automotive aftermarket specific to new and alternative approaches in the area of advanced vehicle system diagnostics. The quick and increasing growth in electrified vehicles every year requires technicians to acquire additional skill sets and create tools "on the fly" instead of purchasing specialty items for every situation or trying to solve a problem without a solution. Automotive Educators need the ability to quickly build training aids for their students. Boot camp participants will learn how to quickly and inexpensively build circuits and software that will permit them to build their own diagnostic tools or training aids. In turn, they will then have ability to control or influence the vehicle’s system operations for the purpose of diagnosing real (or simulated) problems.
These boot camps also address the exponential growth in the future of automotive repair as a whole. Electric drivetrains, autonomous vehicle systems, advanced driver-assistance systems (ADAS), and telematics present new categories of software, firmware, hardware, and networking problems that current automotive professionals have not been adequately equipped to solve; however FutureTech aims to provide solutions to address these technology gaps.
“The industry’s desire to understand, maintain, and repair vehicle components has overshadowed the need to understand what drives the components – the software and electronics,” says vehicle electrification technologist and subject matter expert Dr. Mark Quarto, “modern vehicles are complex and very software-based. Automotive technicians and educators need to acquire skills and experiences that will permit them to flexibly adapt”.
Dr. Quarto designed and developed the training curriculum, and will be personally instructing each of the boot camps.
FutureTech’s mission with its Automotive Software & Electronics Boot Camps is to train automotive professionals today to ensure they can successfully adapt to the technology changes and are not displaced in the future by electronics and programming diagnostic professionals. It views the modern automotive era as one of short intervals of change where the industry’s development of non-traditional systems will eventually edge out traditional skills.
The Fundamentals Boot Camp is designed to take automotive professionals who have little or no experience in coding and electronics and transition them through competency and into proficiency. The Intermediate and Advanced Boot Camps will augment their newly acquired skills to build additional tools and navigate through increasingly complex systems.
Feedback from participants of the Automotive Software & Electronics pilot course was overwhelmingly positive. Automotive professionals from Nissan and the State of Oregon Fleet, as well as aftermarket repair specialists and automotive educators who took the course in June 2018, expressed that it exceeded their expectations and believed it would help meet many of their immediate needs in current and future tasks.
FutureTech encourages prospective participants to register early due to limited seating capacity for each boot camp. Each participant receives their own storage case that includes a microcontroller, USB cable and USB device with over 180 software files and 100+ data files that they will use during the boot camp, and take with them when they are finished. Lunch and snacks are also included in the registration fee. Hotel room blocks are currently being coordinated and information will be provided when it is available. Detailed boot camp outlines and daily agendas, specific location information, early bird pricing, and more can be found at http://www.futuretechauto.com/swbootcamp.
