In connected car news are Red Hat, GM, Hyundai Mobis, Vector, Humatics, Onsemi, HERE, Harman and Keysight.
Red Hat and GM to Co-Develop Software
Red Hat, Inc., the world’s leading provider of open source solutions, and General Motors (NYSE:GM) announced a collaboration to help advance software-defined vehicles at the edge. The companies expect to expand an ecosystem of innovation around the Red Hat In-Vehicle Operating System, which provides a functional-safety certified Linux operating system foundation intended for the ongoing evolution of GM’s Ultifi software platform.
The collaboration between Red Hat and GM is a significant moment in the convergence of the transportation and technology industries, with Red Hat’s cloud-native, enterprise-grade open source operating system accelerating the development of GM’s software-defined vehicle programs following Ultifi’s initial launch. This will enable both companies to offer customers more valuable features responsibly in a fraction of the typical development time.
In-vehicle software systems are complex and require high levels of cybersecurity protection and stringent certifications due to critical safety priorities. In current systems, these robust requirements can often lengthen the development process and make vehicle software updates difficult, with each update requiring recertification. Together, GM and Red Hat intend to make these complex vehicle updates simpler and more frequent by implementing continuous functional-safety certification into the Ultifi platform with Red Hat In-Vehicle Operating System pioneering the continuous certification approach, announced last year.
The integrated software is expected to support a variety of in-vehicle safety- and non-safety-related applications, including infotainment, advanced driver assistance systems, body control and connectivity. The transportation industry can benefit from faster innovation and better sustainability through standardization with open source Linux and cloud-native technologies. Common standards can help increase software reuse and achieve a more scalable design process, giving GM the ability to dedicate more resources toward new personalized in-cabin experiences, vehicle modes and other features customers will enjoy.
With the integration of the Red Hat In-Vehicle Operating System into the Ultifi platform, GM and Red Hat look to achieve:
- Reduced costs from consolidation and reuse of software across a common platform
- An improved development cycle for faster time-to-market with new customer features and software improvements
- A continuous functional safety certification for systems related to safety applications
- Creation of new services, business models and revenue streams
Red Hat will contribute to the phased rollout of Ultifi, GM’s end-to-end vehicle software platform which will launch in 2023. Ultifi will enable a frequent and more seamless delivery of software-defined features, apps and services to customers over-the-air. To do this, the platform separates the application software from the hardware to offer application program interfaces for software development. Creating a more flexible architecture unlocks the potential for more cloud-based services, faster software development and new value for customers without affecting basic hardware controls.
As a Linux-based system, Ultifi is designed to be universally usable for GM developers, suppliers and the developer community at large. Using Linux allows for skilled talent from many industries to quickly get up to speed and bolster innovation through non-traditional thinking. With numerous sensors and rich amounts of anonymized data, vehicle software presents a uniquely exciting opportunity for developers to work beyond the limits of typical consumer smart devices. In fact, authorized third-party developers who meet strict security, safety and privacy standards will be given access to innovate on Ultifi to benefit GM customers directly.
The automotive industry is at an inflection point as consumers begin to assess what the future of their driving experience could look like. As open source and automotive leaders, respectively, Red Hat and GM are poised to help define and connect the automotive ecosystem that will drive solutions for next-generation vehicles. .
Hyundai Mobis & Vector Partner for Automotive Software
Hyundai Mobis and Vector have agreed to the joint development of automotive software platforms. Vector, a German premium partner of AUTOSAR, which endorses global standards for automotive software, is a leading provider of development tools and software platforms to global automakers and suppliers.
As software platforms have become a critical component in defining competitiveness in vehicle manufacturing, automakers are now requiring their suppliers to adopt AUTOSAR-based software platforms with proven quality and versatility.
Through this MOU, the two companies are anticipating increased competitiveness of their automotive software in the global automotive industry.
The two companies will first install the co-developed software in core components related to parking systems, autonomous driving sensors, infotainment systems, and electrified parts. It is also expected that this list of core components installed with the platform will grow further.
Humatics Releases New Microlation Transponder
Humatics, the market leader in highly-precise location-based radio frequency technology, announces a successful release of a new Microlocation transponder that is 66% smaller than the previous version. This enhancement enables a new level of deployment options for the market.
The Humatics transponder is the electronic “tag” that is attached to a high value asset enabling its location to be digitized, with a unique ID, and streamed many times per second for real-time positioning. This specific positioning data enables localization, navigation and collaboration of robotics, tooling, surgical instruments, and even humans.
Onsemi Chosen by NIO
Onsemi (Nasdaq: ON), a leader in intelligent power and sensing technologies, announced that global automotive innovator NIO Inc. chose the latest VE-Trac™ Direct SiC power modules from onsemi for its next-generation electric vehicles (EVs). The silicon carbide (SiC)-based power modules enable longer range, higher efficiency and faster acceleration for EVs. The collaboration of the two companies is expediting the commercialization of SiC technologies to bring EVs equipped with advanced semiconductor material to the market.
At the heart of an EV, the main traction inverter converts battery energy into large amounts of torque and acceleration. The VE-Trac Direct SiC is an integrated single side direct cooling (SSDC) power module in a six-pack configuration with a low turn on resistance of 1.7 mohm. This platform implements the second generation SiC MOSFET technology from onsemi to achieve new levels of performance, efficiency, and quality while sharing a compatible package footprint with its IGBT predecessor. An integrated pin fin baseplate enables direct liquid cooling and easy assembly which allows maximum power output and more efficient thermal dissipation.
“From all the solutions we considered, the VE-Trac Direct SiC traction power modules offered the best efficiency during testing, allowing us to extend our New European Driving Cycle (NEDC) range by 4% compared to the current silicon solution,” said Alan S. Zeng, senior vice president at NIO. “onsemi convinced us with the high performance and reliability of its products as well as the excellent support from its engineering and management team. We look forward to collaborating with onsemi on bringing more innovative EVs to market for generations to come.”
The VE-Trac offerings, including previously introduced VE-Trac Dual and VE-Trac Direct platforms, are available in silicon-based IGBT and in SiC with various voltages, and for traction inverter power ranging from 100 to 250 kW. With its standardized mechanical footprints and expanded power ratings, the VE-Trac product family is designed to effortlessly scale EV power outputs, accelerating the adoption of hybrid and battery EVs (BEV).
“This design collaboration is the culmination of substantial efforts onsemi has put into developing the right technologies for emerging applications such as smart EVs,” said Simon Keeton, executive vice president and general manager of Power Solutions Group at onsemi. “onsemi is the only supplier of silicon carbide solutions with vertical integration capability including SiC boule growth, substrate, epitaxy, device fabrication, best-in-class integrated modules and discrete package solutions. We are rapidly expanding our SiC capacity and are uniquely positioned to address the growing EV market with supply assurance, performance, quality and tailored SiC end solutions.”
NIO is a pioneer in the premium smart EV market, thanks in part to its unique Battery-as-a-Service (BaaS), a breakthrough innovation in both technology and business model. The carmaker, who is leading the wave of smart EV and BEV adoptions in China, is gaining significant market share and aiming to change the way consumers use these vehicles and elevate their entire ownership experience.
HERE Tech Partners AWS
HERE Technologies, the world’s leading location data and technology platform, today announced it has entered a five-year strategic collaboration agreement with Amazon Web Services (AWS) to help organizations improve their supply chain visibility, transportation and logistics (T&L), fleet routing, and estimated times of arrival (ETAs) from the first-to-last mile of delivery.
According to Gartner®, “real-time transportation visibility continues to be a key priority for shippers and 3PLs, and their customers,” and by 2023, 50% of global leading enterprises will have invested in real-time transportation visibility solutions.[i] AnotherGartner report states, “increasingly, supply chain visibility adoption is no longer a “nice to have” for any organization— no matter the size, geography or industry.”[ii]
As part of the collaboration, HERE will list its Supply Chain Solutions that are utilized by T&L companies globally in AWS Marketplace, a curated digital catalog that customers can use to find, buy, deploy, and manage third-party software, data, and services to build solutions and run their businesses. Additionally, HERE will work with AWS to bring to market advanced capabilities for T&L participants to leverage, such as warehouse and yard management, predictive ETA calculations, and CO2 fleet emission solutions.
HERE Supply Chain Solutions build on enterprise-grade map content and core location services (APIs for advanced traffic enabled routing, geofencing, geocoding, and mobile SDKs). HERE Supply Chain Solutions connect and integrate data from multiple stakeholders in the transportation ecosystem to optimize planning, prediction of events, shipment ETAs, and location-based analytics.
HERE Supply Chain Solutions include:
- HERE Asset Tracking delivers real-time visibility of asset location and status. HERE leverages a Platform-as-a-Service model to enable businesses to track their assets seamlessly indoor and out. Businesses can reduce time and money spent on missing equipment and focus on optimizing asset utilization and efficiency.
- HERE Tour Planning creates cost- or time-optimized tours for all vehicles in a fleet, incorporating vehicle type and capacity, to maximize utilization. The calculations reflect current traffic and use special truck-routing attributes, such as road, height, and turn restrictions, when heavy vehicles are used.
- HERE Last Mile is an end-to-end software-as-a-service (SaaS) application for managing last mile and urban deliveries. It comes with a web-planning dashboard, mobile driver app, and real-time tracking for more accurate ETAs. Customers can easily integrate with their existing order management and Customer Relationship Management systems or use it standalone.
“The requirements for efficient tour planning are constantly growing in the transportation industry, corresponding to increased shipment volumes, complex planning processes and a shortage of skilled workers,” said Tobias Braun, IT Project Manager at Active Logistics. “Using HERE Tour Planning, we have developed a comprehensive application that fully automates the transport planning process, with accurate traffic data, shipment prioritization, and delivery window compliance. This solution allows customers to reduce the time needed to plan hundreds of vehicles’ routes from several hours to just a few minutes.”
AWS is supporting HERE’s innovative location-based service applications on AWS to increase visibility across supply chains while tackling some of the largest challenges in T&L globally. The development roadmap includes:
- Extending asset visibility beyond transportation modes and into the yards and warehouses;
- Enabling tracking beyond containers, pallets, and cages to monitoring the location and status of actual shipments;
- Increasing the accuracy of predictive arrival and departure times (ETA/ETD) across transportation modes with AI/ML; and
- Providing services to measure fleet CO2 emissions in compliance with global standards and to conduct what-if scenario planning for fleet transitions to alternative fuels and drive trains.
“At the center of supply chain visibility is location intelligence. We have seen now that deep insights on the ‘where’ and ‘when’ dimensions of operations deliver tremendous value, from optimizing inbound and outbound logistics to middle and last mile delivery execution,” said Edzard Overbeek, CEO at HERE Technologies. “We are proud to work with AWS on deploying these cost and time saving solutions for companies to minimize dwell times, predict ETAs more accurately across every stage, and begin the crucial step of measuring fleet CO2 emissions as the transition to EV vehicles accelerates and economies de-carbonize.”
“T&L companies around the world rely on real-time visibility for customer satisfaction and operational efficiency. When shipments do not arrive on time, or don’t arrive at all, someone’s bottom line is impacted,” said Bill Vass, Vice President, AWS Engineering. “The AWS Services for data management and aggregation power HERE Supply Chain Solutions, and are required for the most relevant customer data to be conflated with the latest location intelligence to solve the visibility and predictability problem throughout a supply chain.”
HERE is a partner to customers across the ecosystem of shippers, 3PL’s, 4PL’s, freight forwarders, and road carriers. Hundreds of companies within the transportation, logistics, and mobility sectors utilize HERE location data, software, and technology to create leading fuel, time, and cost saving applications.
By integrating supply chain data and combining it with rich enterprise-grade location data and services, HERE provides meaningful insights for supply chain operators to better optimize their workflows across the entire supply chain, from factory to inside the warehouse and outside on the yard, all the way to the last mile delivery. With data analytics, HERE machine learning algorithms can predict possible disruptions, identify patterns, and prescribe strategies to improve overall supply chain logistics performance.
Harman Supports AWS
Harman, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd. focused on connected technologies and solutions for automotive, consumer, and enterprise markets, announced support for the AWS for Automotive initiative from Amazon Web Services (AWS) with the Harman Over-the-Air (OTA) software update solution designed to help Original Equipment Manufacturers (OEMs) meet increased security needs in their vehicles. The solution, which was showcased at the AWS “Software Defined Vehicle” online conference, enables OEMs to deliver new consumer experiences throughout the life of a vehicle.
“Today, rising security threats and a rapidly expanding landscape can make managing software challenging for OEMs. Our objective at Harman is to take the friction out of that process,” said Michal Geva, Vice President and General Manager, OTA and Cybersecurity at Harman. “The Harman OTA solution streamlines security management with an end-to-end secure software update campaign that gives automakers confidence in their solutions today and flexibility to safely add new features down the road.”
Harman OTA enables automakers and Tier-1 suppliers to adapt to an evolving market landscape by securely managing all in-vehicle software components, including firmware, applications, configurations, settings, and maps on head units, TCUs (Telematics Control Units) and ECUs (Electronic Control Units)—anywhere and at any time. Using the Harman OTA solution and AWS, updates can be pushed to millions of vehicles in the field easily, efficiently, and securely.
AWS for Automotive is an initiative featuring services and solutions from AWS and AWS Partners, built specifically for automotive customers. The initiative makes it easier for automotive customers to select the right tools and partners for their highest-priority workloads across the automotive ecosystem. For customers looking to accelerate deployments with solution-specific support, AWS for Automotive also identifies dedicated AWS automotive industry specialists, AWS Professional Services teams, and leading AWS Partners in each solution area.
The Harman OTA solution will be on display at events throughout this year, allowing attendees to receive an interactive demo that showcases the management of all in-vehicle software components. The demo focuses on the creation and execution of a secure end-to-end software update campaign showcasing how Harman’s market-leading OTA solution makes it easy to add new features and functionality post-production.
Keysight Tech’s New PD1550A
-Keysight Technologies, Inc. (NYSE: KEYS), a leading technology company that delivers advanced design and validation solutions to help accelerate innovation to connect and secure the world, announced the new PD1550A Advanced Dynamic Power Device Analyzer, a next-generation Double-Pulse Tester (DPT) with enhanced capabilities that enable customers to test entire power modules faster and easier than ever before.
Power modules are used in various applications such as electric vehicles (EV), solar power inverters, trains, home appliances and aircraft due to ease of design, high energy density and reliability. New, wide-bandgap (WBG) device-based power modules are now used by designers to take advantage of the device’s fast-switching operation, reducing the size of the power electronic module, and ensuring efficiency. However, WBG power modules also introduce test challenges that require new solutions to properly characterize these devices while eliminating failed prototypes and reducing design cycles.
Introduced in 2019, Keysight’s PD1500A Power Device Dynamic Analyzer / Double-Pulse Tester was the first complete solution for discrete WBG power device characterization and is now used by power converter designers and power semiconductor manufacturers around the world. Now, the new PD1550A expands beyond the PD1500A’s capabilities to offer the first complete integrated solution that tests entire power modules (up to 1360 V, up to 1000 A). As a result, automotive original equipment manufacturers (OEMs), Tier 1 suppliers and power converter designers can test faster and gain more insights into power module characteristics, enhancing the safety and reliability of power circuits for automotive applications.