Mikael Nybacka in action.
Today, Mikael Nybacka, Division of Functional Product Development, presented and defended his Ph.D. thesis “Exploring technologies for service provision in automotive winter testing”. Opponent was Professor Jochen Pohl, Linköping University, and the grading committee consisted of Dr. Anders Claesson, Saab Automobile, Professor Emeritus Jan-Gunnar Persson, KTH, and Professor Birgitta Bergvall-Kåreborn, Luleå University of Technology.
Mikael has in his research studied methods for winter testing of vehicles in order to support the service business of entrepreneurs in Norrbotten, Sweden. His work consists of how the software for vehicle dynamics will be used to improve the testing activities, collaboration and business approach. Vehicle testing activities in Norrbotten are carried out by a large number of automobile and tire manufacturers together with service providers in order to get access to real winter conditions and Mikael have in his work developed a broad base to enable and develop the car test activities and to build up the vehicle test center, CASTT – the Center for Automotive Systems and Technologies Testing. Opponent Jochen Pohl was thoroughly and ably when going through Mikael’s thesis. Mikael explained how he has contributed to the field by including distributed real-time vehicle validation, Remote test management, use of steering robots for repeatability tests and objective evaluation of vehicle drivability. The opposition was very interesting for the audience and stretched from Jacobian matrixes to how future cars will be developed. Chairman of the grading committee, Professor Birgitta Bergvall-Kåreborn later noticed that they were very united in the decision to approve Mikael and gave credit for a very thorough thesis and good presentation. The new doctor was then celebrated with traditional Swedish “smörgåstårta”. We, colleagues at the department, congratulates Mikael on his achievement and wish him well in his future career. The research performed by Mikael has been funded by the Centre for Automotive Systems Technologies and Testing – CASTT at Luleå University of Technology together with EC regional funds.
Mikael, opponent, grading committee, and supervisor Tobias Larsson
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