Automotive Engineering - March 2021 - 18

TECHNOLOGY REPORT

SOFTWARE

Bosch consolidates computing
talent in new mobility division 

battery-less sensing and data collection and transmission from
the wheel - a hostile environment where delivering an electrical source is otherwise difficult " the company said in a release.
Sethi confirmed InWheelSense will be in " early production " in
2023 and volume production by 2025. Evaluation kits, including an attachment setup for existing wheels, is available now.

Power-generation with sensor integration

TDK's InWheelSense module can sense various road and driving
conditions based on the force exerted between the tire and the
wheel. The module uses that same force to create average continuous DC power of around one milliwatt in an 18-inch wheel
when driving at 105 km/h (65 mph). The unit is just 125 mm (4.9
in) long and 19 mm (0.75 in) deep. TDK said as many as 13 EHModules could be attached to a single wheel.
The company said the EH-Module can use measurement of
the forces on the tire-wheel interface to sense speed, road condition and wheel balance, adding that data directly related to
tires and road conditions is vital for driverless robotaxis and other AVs that do not have an operator constantly monitoring driving conditions - or identifying imminent maintenance needs.
Sethi added that data from the InWheelSense module also
could serve as backup for a vehicle's perception sensors,
which can be affected by weather and other disruptions.
The company said the power available from the modules will
be useful for the multiple types of sensors potentially placed in
the wheel or even embedded directly in the tire. Those types of
sensors - and their connectivity requirements - cannot be adequately powered by batteries or platforms such as today's
tire-pressure monitoring (TPM) sensors, Sethi said.
In answer to globally expanding vehicle-related emissions
regulations, the InWheelSense module also has the potential
to directly measure particulate emissions from tires and
brakes, TDK said. Sethi said the company is collaborating with
TPM suppliers to study integration of the InWheelSense module with current TPM functionality.
Bill Visnic

18 March 2021

The enormous growth in software requirements is driven by the growing
complexity and number of vehicle safety and convenience features.
Bosch announced on January 7 during its CES 2021 conference event that it has created a new division labeled CrossDomain Computing Solutions (CDCC). The CDCC division
pools 17,000 of Bosch's automotive software and electronics associates to create a single source for software-intensive systems
for future vehicle architectures. According to Bosch, the market
for such systems is expected to grow 15% annually between now
and 2030, and the organizational move is designed to extend
the supplier's market-leading position. 
 Bosch has assigned software, electrical and electronics
engineers from the areas of driver assistance, automated driving, car multimedia, powertrain and body electronics to the
new unit. " Bosch is an automotive electronics pioneer.
Moreover, for quite some time now, it has also been a software company, "  said Dr. Stefan Hartung, chairman of
Bosch's Mobility Solutions business sector.  " Only a company
with wide-ranging electronics and software expertise will be
in a position to shape the future of mobility. "  
 

Millions of lines of code 

According to Mike Mansuetti, president of Bosch North
America, the combination of electrified and automated driving with personalized connected services is causing significant increase in demand for automotive software and electronics.  " Where a car included roughly 10 million lines of code
in 2010, the software of today's non-automated vehicles already runs to 100 million lines of code, "  Mansuetti said. 
" Tomorrow's automated cars will require up to 500 million. "  
 At the same time, Mansuetti explained, electronics engineering is becoming more complex, directly in line with more
sophisticated vehicle functions.  " In order for us to capitalize
on our longstanding expertise in both of these domains, " he
said, " we are now pooling our software and automotive-electronics expertise. " Of the 17,000 Bosch associates who became part of the new global division at the onset of 2021,
nearly half are software engineers. 
AUTOMOTIVE ENGINEERING

FROM LEFT: TDK; BOSCH

TDK's InWheelSense module can generate around one milliwatt of
power at 65 mph.
Automotive Engineering - March 2021

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Automotive Engineering - March 2021
