Delphi Joins AUTOSAR

New standardized interfaces could substantially reduce electronics software development costs

WUPPERTAL, Germany, April 20 -- Delphi Corp. has joined the AUTOSAR Partnership as a premium member, company officials announced today.

AUTOSAR is a development partnership of automotive industry companies, including vehicle manufacturers and technology suppliers, that are working together to establish an open standard for automotive Electrical / Electronic Architectures. The new standard will bring many benefits for systems developers and vehicle users, including increased reliability, faster innovation and a substantial improvement in software development.

"Over the next ten years, electronics will fundamentally change the way that vehicles are designed and manufactured, as well as the features they offer," said John Nurse, advanced engineering manager (Europe) with Delphi Electronics & Safety Systems. "There are tremendous opportunities for improvements in safety, emissions, comfort and a host of other areas, but with so many different systems and suppliers, making everything work smoothly together will become an increasing challenge. AUTOSAR is an important step towards enabling these developments whilst continuing to improve reliability, quality and the efficiency with which new innovations are brought to market."

The aim of the group is to define the development link between software and hardware, allowing software engineers to focus on innovation rather than having to spend much of their time on interfacing and hardware compatibility issues. The standards developed by AUTOSAR will provide a common framework for the management of functions throughout the vehicle, including powertrain, safety, dynamic control and infotainment. Information flow between applications will be in standard formats, making it independent of the bus architecture chosen by the vehicle manufacturer.

"A fascinating aspect of this industry is that the features offered to customers are becoming more like consumer electronics," said Nurse. "In an increasing number of areas, this means a two-year product lifecycle instead of the seven years typical in the auto industry today. With standard interfaces, systems can be designed to be updated whenever the vehicle owner requires and vehicle manufacturers will be able to focus their resources on innovations that differentiate their products and add value for the user."

The AUTOSAR collaboration is also expected to greatly affect those suppliers responsible for creating the electrical/electronic (E/E) distribution architecture that supports these growing functions within vehicles, said Stefaan Vandevelde, managing director of Delphi Packard Electric's European Operations.

"The AUTOSAR Partnership is taking the approach of considering optimization of the entire vehicle's E/E architecture and functionality, and that will very likely affect, among many other things, the interfaces and integration of these standardized electronics and the supportive software with wiring harness technology," Vandevelde said. "We believe it will simplify the design and development of E/E architecture, allowing us to better manage complexity and optimization of the interfaces associated with electronics and overall E/E architecture."

Delphi expects to contribute to many of the AUTOSAR working groups. "This is a cross-functional initiative," explains Nurse. "With our broad vehicle and systems competency combined with substantial experience in systems integration and close relationships with vehicle manufacturers worldwide, Delphi has a great deal to contribute."

The first production vehicles to incorporate elements of AUTOSAR are expected to be launched around 2007-08.