Automotive Engineering - May 2021 - 16

Software
transforms
vehicle
development
Software-defined
vehicles are driving
major changes
in hardware
and control
architectures.
by Terry Costlow

Software-defined cars are
altering design processes
at Tier 1s and OEMs.

16 May 2021

The electronic architectures that make it possible to
create and manage hundreds of millions of lines of
software are changing swiftly. Burgeoning engineering
and programming operations are rapidly adding manpower as managers transform operations and strategies. Software teams are looking at new ways to write
and deploy programs, with a focus on simplifying the
adoption of third-party applications.
On the hardware side, engineers must devise plans
that make it possible to process code that may be
written and deployed years after the hardware designs
are finalized. Flexibility, scalability and compatibility
are critical factors as strategists find ways to get the
most from hardware and software developments.
" What's required is to have a centralized computing
element. Software can give the hardware the personality you want to give it, " said Nakul Duggal, head of
automotive products at Qualcomm. " We designed our
next generation hardware to be agnostic. "

Open to change
Creating the applications that give product lines and
individual models their personality and functionality
will require a lot of software creation and management. Automated code generation and software reuse
have become commonplace, giving engineering staffs
AUTOMOTIVE ENGINEERING

oftware, already a major factor in vehicle operation, is driving
major changes in design processes as its role continues to expand. Electronic architectures and software development strategies are changing rapidly as software transforms into a dominant vehicle technology.
Software has grown from a few million lines of code to more than
100 million in many vehicles. Some projections predict typical vehicles will have 300 to 500 million lines of code within a few years.
These changes, as well as the increase in the amount of data generated by vehicular systems, are occurring at breakneck speed.
" It's predicted that within the next couple of years, vehicle functions controlled by software will have increased from 10 percent to
40 percent in a span of one decade, " said Tamara Snow, head of
research and advanced engineering, Continental North America.
" And it's not only the software that's increasing. The volumes of
data generated require high-performance computing in order to
process and interpret information coming from connected sensors,
roadways and the cloud. "
Many factors support the creation of what many are calling the
" software-defined car. " Software is a critical element in autonomous
driving. Suppliers note that software makes it possible to alter vehicle
features over the full lifetime of the vehicle, transforming the way
features are created and marketed.
" Software-defined cars bring an end to static life cycles, " said Dirk
Walliser, executive VP corporate R&D, Innovation and Technology, at
ZF. " Carmakers can add things that nobody thought about when the
vehicle was designed. "

Automotive Engineering - May 2021

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