At this year's CES exhibition, in addition to the actions of automobile manufacturers and first-line technology companies, as the technology enablers behind the future intelligent cars, what fresh displays have Bosch, Continental, ZF, and Aptiv brought?
01
Bosch: Launch of demonstration cars, investing 3 billion euros per year in smart cars and future mobility businesses
"Bosch's core business is undergoing a systematic digital transformation, and we want to turn the sales of every digital product into service-oriented revenue," said Dr. Tanja Rückert, Chief Digital Officer of Bosch, in a meeting at CES 2022 in Las Vegas.
To achieve this, Bosch is focusing on combining the Internet of Things (IoT) and artificial intelligence (AI) to create an intelligent Internet of Things. This also includes the mobility business. Bosch believes that the key to realizing smart cars is to create a software-defined future of mobility.
Bosch also invests 4 billion euros a year to strengthen its software capabilities, of which around 3 billion euros are invested in the mobility business. Over the past five years, Bosch has generated sales of around €9 billion in driver assistance systems and related sensors.
AT CES Bosch unveils an electric demonstration vehicle – demonstrating the professionalism and breadth of Bosch systems in software and hardware. Bosch, for example, is developing central computers dedicated to future electronic architectures that will be used in assisted and autonomous driving, car chassis, smart cockpit and body electronics, and continuously improve car functions through OTA updates.
To simplify the development of electric vehicles, Bosch offers pre-integrated components for electric vehicles, such as advanced driving modules (ADMs). ADM combines the powertrain, braking and steering into an integrated unit, allowing automakers to install them into vehicles faster and more cost-effectively.
How can you enable the future of software-defined mobility? Bosch plans to integrate R&D activities for independent applications into the same R&D department in mid-2022. ETAS, a wholly owned subsidiary of Bosch, will develop and sell the basic software, middleware, cloud services, and R&D tools of the automotive GM.
Not only the smart cars of the future, Bosch plans to have all Bosch electronic products connected by 2022. The key to this is the establishment of the Bosch Center for Artificial Intelligence, which shows that Bosch has created benefits in the field of artificial intelligence of about 300 million euros.
02
Continental: Automotive architecture, ShyTech displays, and autonomous driving
At the CES exhibition, the mainland presented a demonstration system for driving in the opposite lane, the HRL131 long-range lidar and the sustainable concept tire.
Regarding the automotive architecture, the Body High Performance Computing Unit (HPC) was previously provided by Continental on the Volkswagen ID. series, but at the same time, Mainland not only provides high-performance computing unit platforms for specific domains such as car cockpit, data management and vehicle interconnection, driving safety and dynamic control or autonomous driving, but also provides modular platform solutions for cross-domain high-performance computing units, which will first be mass-produced in a Future Electric Vehicle of a Chinese automobile manufacturer.
And ShyTech display is more interesting, in fact, it is not a display, the right thing to say should be a new intelligent car interior design scheme, in this interior design, the function buttons, lights and switches composed of control panels can be fully integrated with the display, but only the required content can be seen, rather than other intelligent cockpit interiors, the screen some control physical buttons directly in front of the driver. ShyTech displays can be an A-pillar-to-A solution that fully integrates the entire front-row interior.
With regard to autonomous driving, Continental offers a demonstration system for driving in the reverse lane, with a combination of sensors, an interconnected vehicle system and a heat map algorithm that defines the lane and direction of travel alongside devices. At the same time, Continental is also demonstrating HRL131 long-range lidar with partner AEye.
HRL131 Long-Range LiDAR is an adaptive lidar based on microelectromechanical systems (MEMS) for L3 and L4 autonomous driving solutions. Combining the benefits of high dynamic spatial resolution with long-range detection, it is expected to be operational in 2024 and will follow the already mass-produced continental vehicle-grade short-range lidar HFL110, which may become the world's first high-resolution solid-state long-range lidar sensor to be mass-produced in the automotive market.
03
Aptiv: The latest achievements in the development of SVATM, the next generation of intelligent vehicle architecture is being realized
As early as CES 2020, Aptiv came up with the design concept of intelligent vehicle architecture (SVATM), and this year AT CES, Aptiv announced a series of SVAtm-based developments.
Like the software-defined car mentioned now, the Smart Vehicle Architecture (SVATM) is an upgradable, open vehicle architecture platform that contains logical blocks that can be flexibly expanded to refresh the product experience and improve the life cycle of the car, and the Intelligent Vehicle Architecture (SVATM) can be applied from entry-level/compact models to L4 models with autonomous driving capabilities.
At CES, Aptiv demonstrated the operation of regional controllers such as power data centers (PDCs) and vehicle central controllers (CVC) on SVATM, which are seen as the next logical step in driving the transformation of automotive architectures to intelligent electrics.
Aptiv believes that in smart cars, the configuration of three zone controllers is usually the optimal approach, but in addition to the zone controller, a vehicle central controller (CVC) is also required. In Aptiv's SVATM, PDC, CVC are called middleware, Aptiv believes that in SVATM PDC, CVC and other middleware allow automakers to make full use of the original software, rather than "tearing over and starting over", can greatly reduce the development time of new cars.
In addition, at CES, Aptiv also showcased the Open Service Platform (OSP) as well as new charging technologies, which run the complex software required for areas such as advanced safety and in-vehicle infotainment and user experience tasks, with standardized interfaces.
However, Aptiv's new charging technology uses direct contact technology, which can increase the current intensity from 200 amperes to 500 amperes, charging speed is 5 times faster than existing products, and Aptiv has also come up with a lightweight solution for the entire electric drive system to improve battery life and cost.
04
ZF: Conditional autonomous driving systems
At CES, ZF showcased its substantial progress in its next-generation mobility strategy and will join forces with Vietnamese car company VinFast to launch the first passenger car, the L3 conditional autonomous driving system.
Autonomous shuttle bus and commercial vehicle solutions are the areas that ZF is looking for, after ZF launched autopilot technology components including coASSIST in China with Dongfeng, and in response to customer interest in L2+ solutions, ZF launched a coDRIVE system with traffic congestion assistance and highway driving assistance functions.
But at CES, ZF's Automated Transport Systems team showcased a virtual turnkey solution that can help customers plan, operate and implement automated shuttle bus systems that can be used both in cities and connecting cities and remote rural areas, as well as advanced automation technologies for agricultural equipment, mining, off-highway machinery and automated forklifts.