Automotive electronics: Application & technology megatrends

Abstract

The complexity of the requirements for automotive applications is increasing at an astonishing pace. Concepts from other domains are being introduced in order to address these demands. For example we now need to cover fault tolerant and failsafe systems. The functional safety of systems, products and processes increases with every day and with every new development and we must maintain a grasp of the risks during every phase: from the first concept through development and from operation through shutdown. With the increased connectivity and complexity there are serious security challenges for the design of automotive hardware/software architectures due to attacks. Virtualization is now being made available in automotive embedded environments providing developers with the ultimate open platform: the ability to run any flavor of operating system in any combination, creating an unprecedented flexibility for deployment and usage. With the immense processing power that is being unlocked with multi-processor systems we are now able to address complex issues such as a complete inspection of the vehicle's environment. In this paper we will discuss the challenges of implementing a safe, secure, complex driver assistance system that paves the way towards autonomous driving.