Automotive News Europe provides a very informative interview with CTO of Continental. Here is a short excerpt:
Automtive News: What are the main challenges in the move toward software-defined vehicles?
CTO: We need to understand the magnitude of the transformation. We are not climbing the Alps anymore. We are in the Himalayas. We need different equipment, and we need to train in a different way. In the hardware-defined vehicle approach, we developed the hardware based on the specifications written more or less by our customers. We were developing and producing products in a very top-down approach. In a software-defined approach, we start by asking ourselves: “How do we distribute the software functions in the car to enable the mobility of the future?” This future includes frequent updates and the addition of new functions that come in after the initial sale of the car. These new functions will impact how and what people will use, purchase and consume in the future. Therefore, we will have to develop our products in a completely different way than before. You need to have a deep understanding of the vehicle architecture and, of course, how to develop your software. We have to think about this even if the hardware does not yet exist, which we can do through virtualization and twinning methods.
