Centrale Nantes becomes a playground for the JEMARO Days' Robotics Competition

The highlight of the JEMARO Days will be the robotics competition, titled the “Autonomous Vehicle Challenge.” Four teams, comprising current students and alumni of the JEMARO program, will design algorithms to detect and avoid construction cones using a robotic Renault Zoé vehicle. Participants will face several challenges, including cone detection using an Ouster OS2 LiDAR, obstacle avoidance with a trajectory tracking algorithm, and developing a visualization interface with rviz. An optional task involving free space detection will also be offered for those aiming to push the boundaries further.

Teams will be evaluated on multiple criteria such as the speed and accuracy of cone detection, the effectiveness of obstacle avoidance, and passenger comfort. They will have several attempts to achieve their best performance and will be required to present their system architecture and algorithms. 

The winners of the competition will be announced on the afternoon of Thursday 10 July, and will receive a prize.

JEMARO Days

The JEMARO Days 2025 will feature renowned scientific speakers, including:

• Stephany Berrio Perez from the University of Sydney (Australia), a specialist in autonomous robotics
• Guillaume Caron from the University of Picardie Jules Verne (France), an expert in computer vision for robotics
• Maki Sugimoto from Keio University (Japan), an authority in augmented reality

Former students will also return to share their professional and research experiences, inspiring the next generation of students:

• Aman Arora, PhD student at the University of Luxembourg, presenting his research on autonomous mobility in space
• Isaac Kortemeyer, Automation Engineer at Parrot Drones
• Luis Valdes Alvarez, Robotics Junior Researcher at TECNALIA

About JEMARO

Accredited in 2019 as an “Erasmus Mundus Master” by the European Commission, JEMARO (Japan-Europe Master on Advanced Robotics) has since trained nearly a hundred students in advanced robotics through a two-year programme in Europe and Japan. Its four partner institutions—Centrale Nantes in France, the University of Genoa in Italy, Warsaw University of Technology in Poland, and Keio University in Japan—have built on more than 15 years of collaboration in double degrees and Erasmus Mundus master’s programmes in this field.

The programme is coordinated by Centrale Nantes, under the supervision of Vincent Frémont, Professor and Director of International Relations at Centrale Nantes, in partnership with Keio University, a long-standing and prestigious partner of our institution.