The 'Paradigm Shift' of the Software-Defined Vehicle era - Elektrobit's Senior Director, Dr Moritz Neukirchner

Imagine a future 'where a 12-year-old car receives regular software updates that enable you to travel further on a single charge, with greater ride comfort, or with greater levels of support from advanced driver assistance (ADAS) systems'.

This is the vision of Dr Moritz Neukirchner, Senior Director, Strategic Product Management, Software-defined Vehicle at Elektrobit, a global vendor of embedded and connected software products and services for the automotive industry. .

He believes that software-defined vehicles (SDVs) will continually improve over time, whether in terms of new infotainment and connectivity functions, new and improved ADAS features, better performance or greater real-world range for hybrids and electric vehicles (EVs).

"Paradigm shift is a term perhaps over-used within the automotive industry, but the software-defined vehicle area represents nothing less," says Neukirchner.

"This possibility is nothing short of revolutionary and turns on its head the established notion that a vehicle is at its best when you’re handed the keys in the showroom."

Elektrobit's open-source-based automotive operating system – EB corbos Linux for Safety Applications – is compliant to the industry’s highly demanding functional safety standards.

This development enables OEMs and suppliers to use open source in key safety-related applications including ADAS, powertrain, and autonomous vehicles.

"This is a major breakthrough for the industry, enabling OEMs to reduce development times, enhance robustness and bring new models to market in as little as half the time – with commensurate reductions in development costs," he says.

"Given the unprecedented challenges driven by electrification, greater competition from the raft of new EV brands entering the market, and the drive towards software-defined vehicles, the fundamental advantages offered by open-source will enable OEMs to stay ahead and deliver the innovations that their customers want and expect."

The consumer benefits from a greater choice of more advanced models that offer state-of-the-art technologies.

"The cost savings that OEMs achieve during development and launch of those models can be invested in the creation of the new features and functions that will be made available to those models throughout their entire product life cycle, which promises to significantly enhance the customer experience," says Neukirchner.

Cybersecurity Is Fundamental

For SDVs to be successful, cybersecurity and regulation are critical.

"Every stakeholder from the OEM all the way down through every level of the supply chain must place an absolute focus on ensuring that hacking and other forms of cyber-attack cannot compromise the vehicle itself, the owner’s data, or the safety of the public. Cybersecurity is fundamental. It must be considered a core element of the SDV’s DNA and within the design, development, and validation process itself," says Neukirchner.

"The growing number of communication channels increases the potential of gateways for hackers, so to create a secure vehicle, it’s essential that you consider all the connected elements and take a holistic approach," he adds.

Elektrobit’s cybersecurity concept covers all the layers: the individual components, ECUs, and bus systems inside the vehicle, and external interfaces and protocols, as well as end-to-end encryption.

"The security mechanisms are designed for secure communication, authenticated identification, theft protection, anomaly detection, intrusion detection, and all types of cryptographic calculations, secure updates, and secure diagnostics. Our platform-independent, modular offering also allows OEMs to pick and choose separate products and solutions as they see fit."

"This not only ensures system integrity and prevents attempted misuse, but also meets the ever-increasing legal requirements for data privacy, data protection, and information security."

Elektrobit's embedded software engineering experience enables it to deliver tailor-made solutions for ADAS and automated driving, including Level 5 applications.

"We work across the full spectrum within this domain, and our portfolio includes electronic horizon technology that provides data on the road ahead beyond the range of the vehicle’s sensors, centimetre-precise vehicle positioning solutions, vehicle environment modelling using sensor data fusion, and development, simulation, testing and validation of ADAS and automated driving functions," he explains.

Voice-Enabled Functions

Finally, we asked Neukirchner what the in-cabin experience will be like by the end of the decade.

"Today, touchscreens are the default user interface, and they are becoming larger as OEMs seek to move more functionality – including climate control and transmission control – away from physical user interfaces such as buttons, switches and dials and integrate them into the screen," he says.

"Will this trend continue as we approach 2030? I’m not so sure it will, not least because Euro NCAP has recognised this issue and made physical controls for certain functions, such as direction indicators and windscreen wipers, mandatory to qualify for the maximum 5-star safety rating from 2026."

"Moving forward, the features and functions must be easy to use or people simply won’t use them at all – which defeats the purpose – and they cannot be a distraction. Big screens will stay, but I don’t think we’ll still rely on touch as the main user interface in future, at least not for the functions that are frequently used while driving," he adds.

"I believe that the best automotive user-concepts will come from the application of voice-enabled and context-aware AI," concludes  Neukirchner.