Software-Defined Vehicles Are the Next Big Thing. Or Something.

Centralized OS, constantly connected, OTA updates.. what could go wrong?

Today’s vehicles are becoming more and more computer and less and less automobile. Software-defined vehicles (SDV) shift a lot of the hardware in a vehicle, including relays, ECUs, and switches, to software-based platforms. This, theoretically, allows automakers to make changes and improvements to the vehicle after it’s been built and even after it’s been sold.

This shift to computer-based everything is happening despite the problems with sourcing chipsets and other computer hardware. What automakers have been doing, in fact, is shrinking the number of computers in the vehicle via consolidation while at the same time increasing the amount of processing that the vehicle does.