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Vehicle Electrical/Electronic (EE) Architecture Strategic Insights and Growth Opportunities

  • Report

  • 83 Pages
  • December 2022
  • Region: Global
  • Frost & Sullivan
  • ID: 5711418

OEMs will Adopt Full Zonal Architecture Only When Risk and Cost of Transition from Legacy Systems Reduces with Technology Maturity

Today, consumers expect their cars to offer features that enhance safety, comfort, and convenience. Over the years, every electronically controlled feature added to vehicles demanded its own electronic control unit (ECU) and supporting communication interfaces, adding more components and burdening vehicle electrical/electronic (EE) architecture with complexity, weight, and cost. A typical premium sedan would house about 100 ECUs and a kilometre-long wiring harness but would not be future proof.

Megatrends such as CASE convergence are expected to augment this burden as a growing number of features are added under each domain. These advanced features will require higher processing speed, no latency, and a V2X enabler. To manage these concerns and meet the requirements, automakers and the vehicle development ecosystem are reconsidering the legacy approach and architectural design. With the advent of battery-electric and software-defined vehicles (SDVs), OEMs plan to redesign platform layers ground up, starting with vehicle EE architecture, built on high-performance computers and Ethernet backbone.

Table of Contents

1 Strategic Imperatives
  • Why Is It Increasingly Difficult to Grow?
  • The Strategic Imperative 8™
  • The Impact of the Top 3 Strategic Imperatives on the Vehicle EE Architecture Industry
  • Growth Opportunities Fuel the Growth Pipeline Engine™
2 Growth Environment
  • Scope of Analysis
  • Growth Drivers
  • Growth Restraints
  • Major Trends Driving SDV Growth
  • SDVs - Key Characteristics
3 Growth of Electronics and SW-related Features in Vehicles
  • Growth of Electronically Driven Functions in Passenger Vehicles
  • Traditional Approach to Add New Functions in Passenger Vehicles
4 Need for the Reconsideration of EE Architecture
  • Traditional Distributed Architecture
  • Challenges for Existing Distributed Architecture
  • Consolidation of Functions in Domain-controlled Architecture
  • Benefits and Challenges of Domain-controlled Architecture
  • Engineering Approach to Address E/E Architectural Challenges
  • The Move to Zonal Architecture
  • Benefits and Challenges of Zonal Architecture
  • Domain-Zonal Hybrid Architecture
  • Holistic Pathway to Zonal Architecture
  • Alternative Pathways to E/E Architecture Evolution
  • OEM Challenges in Adopting Zonal Architecture
  • Evolving Automotive Value Chain
  • EE Architecture Ecosystem
5 Technologies Enabling EE Architecture Evolution
  • Central Gateway
  • Central Gateway Evolution: Key Trends
  • Automotive Ethernet Evolution
  • High-performance Controllers (HPCs)
6 OEM Approach
  • GM: Digital Vehicle Platform
  • GM: Digital Vehicle Platform Proliferation
  • Volkswagen: E3 to E3 2.0 Unified Architecture
  • Volkswagen: E3 Architecture Roadmap for Production Vehicles
  • Stellantis: STLA Brain Architecture
  • Stellantis: Proliferation of Brain Architecture within Group Vehicles
  • Mercedes Benz: Service-oriented Domain Architecture
  • Mercedes Benz: Evolution of Vehicle Platforms and New Architecture
  • Tesla: Move from Partial Zonal Architecture to Full Zonal Architecture
  • EE Architecture Evolution Roadmap of OEM Groups
  • EE Transition Strategies: Traditional OEMs versus Emerging EV OEMs
  • OEM Benchmarking to Achieve Zonal Architecture
7 Tier Supplier Solution
  • Bosch: EE Architecture Solutions
  • Aptiv: Smart Vehicle Architecture Roadmap
  • Continental E/E Architecture Service Portfolio
  • Visteon: New Zonal EE Architecture
8 Technology Company Offerings
  • Snapdragon Digital Chassis
  • NXP S32G Vehicle Network Processors for EE Transformation
  • S32G: Key Features and Applications
  • Renesas VC4 Architecture
  • Semiconductor Ecosystem
9 Cybersecurity for EE Architecture
  • Potential Cyberattack Scenarios in SDVs
  • Overview of Cybersecurity Threats to In-vehicle Networks
  • Different Types of Cybersecurity Solutions in Vehicles
  • OEM Cybersecurity Partnerships and Strategies
10 Growth Opportunity Universe
  • Growth Opportunity 1: In-vehicle HW Enabling Transition to Zonal Architecture
  • Growth Opportunity 2: Consolidation of Functions in HPC and Mixing of Data Traffic in Ethernet Increasing Demand for Cybersecurity
  • Growth Opportunity 3: SW Companies Gaining Prominence in the New Value Chain
  • The Last Word
11 Next Steps
  • Your Next Steps
  • About the Publisher
  • List of Exhibits
  • Legal Disclaimer

Companies Mentioned (Partial List)

A selection of companies mentioned in this report includes, but is not limited to:

  • Aptiv
  • Bosch
  • Continental
  • GM
  • Mercedes Benz
  • NXP
  • Renesas Electronics
  • Snapdragon 
  • Stellantis
  • Tesla
  • Visteon
  • Volkswagen