Behind the connected vehicle lies the development of operating systems for vehicles. A race that disrupts automotive design.
Simultaneously manage the infotainment system (GPS, radio) but also driving aids (regulator-speed limiter or lane following), this is what Qualcomm offers with Snapdragon Ride Flex. Unveiled this week at CES 2023 in Las Vegas (Nevada, United States), this new family of SoCs (System on a Chip, a kind of super-chip bringing together the main functionalities of a computer) seems to bring the car from a smartphone on wheels. And also seems to put a head start between the North American company and the historic car manufacturers.
One of the holy grails of 21st century motoring is to pack many features into a single chip. And a real revolution in his way of designing a car. “Unlike a computer which has an OS to run all its software, a car has a card for each function in which a processor will embed software which will execute this function”, explains an expert in the sector. Which evokes a “dish of spaghetti”.
As cars carry more and more features, the number of on-board chips and connections between them has exploded. With exponential R&D costs with each new development and increasingly complex cars. Centralization then seems obvious to move to the “software-defined vehicle” (a vehicle where everything is managed by the software and which can be updated regularly).
“It’s a bit of a ring to rule them all,” sums up Guillaume Crunelle, partner in charge of automotive at Deloitte.
“Manufacturers must move from a decentralized logic, with separate systems for braking, infotainment, headlights, to a merger, bridges between functions and therefore bridges between the different areas of expertise”. And bridges with new expertise, that of software, to develop an operating system that will manage all the functionalities in parallel without fail, for obvious security issues.
The only one to offer this type of architecture today is called Tesla. The historical builders are looking for their strategy. At the end of November, Renault announced a partnership with Qualcomm to develop its future vehicles.. Qualcomm intends to invest in Ampère, the spin-off of the manufacturer dedicated to the electric and connected car. The diamond brand also works with Google. The Android Automotive operating system is thus on board the new Mégane For more than one year.
Some manufacturers are trying to develop everything in-house, like Volkswagen, in order to master this new area from start to finish, a strategy that has so far not succeeded in the German group. Honda has chosen a novel approach. At CES, the Japanese manufacturer unveiled Afeela, the joint venture he created with Sony to launch an electric car. Car that will be based on Qualcomm’s digital chassis.
This strategic choice between controlling everything in-house and collaborating with specialists is a complex financial equation. Some experts thus see the automobile as the world of the telephone fifteen years ago: each brand then developed the device and the operating system that accompanies it. Today, only two operating systems cohabit following a progressive choice of the sector and a desire to limit R&D costs.
A solution that could appeal to some manufacturers? Not necessarily, summarizes Guillaume Crunelle: “For manufacturers, the real question remains that of the value of the car: where does it fit? If the battery represents 40% of the value, the software also 40%, whether their stay if they don’t develop either?”.
