The Software Defined Car: The Death of Freedom

Jon Summers is the Motoring Historian. He was a company car thrashing technology sales rep that turned into a fairly inept sports bike rider. On his show he gets together with various co-hosts to talk about new and old cars, driving, motorbikes, motor racing, motoring travel. John discusses his experiences at two recent presentations on the future of automobility. The first presentation by McKinsey focused on the concept of a 'software-defined vehicle' (SDV) - likening modern vehicles to connected devices similar to smartphones, and outlining six key areas for achieving success in this domain. These areas included hardware simplification, increased collaboration among manufacturers, leveraging cloud infrastructure, and shifting the focus from traditional engineering to software-driven engineering. The second presentation by a company called Aicas emphasized AI's role in achieving interoperability and managing data within the intelligent vehicle edge, highlighting the importance of selectively recording useful data to avoid latency issues. Both presentations indicate an automotive industry pivoting towards making money from data rather than traditional car components and underscore the industry-wide challenge of securing and managing this data. ==================== Down the road waits misery ... Why cannot death just set me free? Amon Amarth - Across the Rainbow Bridge A McKinsey presentation on the Software Defined Car Dave Freiburger on Route 66  Amon Amarth - Cry of the Blackbirds Freiburger, graffiti, and an evolving art form Aicas presentation on methods of packaging/selling the data streaming off cars The McKinsey Presenter Defining The Software Defined Car BMW Heated Seats Debacle “Extending the life of the hardware by making the software updateable on the fly” The extended lifetime of the B-52 Nuclear Bomber Eating the shit sandwich of OTA (Over The Airwaves) Upgrades “How Much Compute Does An Edge of Cloud Device Need?” Tesla vs. Chevelle article Cradle of Filth - Scorched Earth Erotica Hardware Consolidation - brands will merge, powertrain will no longer be the differentiator Lidar - doing the work three times not once Cradle of Filth - Her Ghost In The Fog Parallels with the death of the British Motorcycle Industry Venom - Black Metal The pivot from engineering led business to sales led, and how tragic that is for car design ZF visit and the pivot from cogs to software pod The Revenue Model Is Business To Business Data Sales “Not about performance, but about the journey that you’re on” (barf) Wanting to be the kind of person who owns and Subaru in Commercialand The car as a TV, where you buy streaming programs Paradise Lost - Widow The hardware and software in the car needs headroom to come with the over the airwave upgrades The inefficiency of today’s OEMs software point solutions Monthly ungrades to software, while the hardware has to last 5-10 years  Software defined = a business model, around selling data Security, Software DMZ’s salmon pasta, salad and over the airwaves upgrades to brakes Entombed - That’s When I Became a Satanist Tape Back Up Sodom - Agent Orange James Hunt of Aicas, and James Hunt, Formula 1 Champion and playboy Venom - Countess Bathory Is AI ready for the intelligent vehicle edge? Aicas CEO has a fascinating reaction to Tesla’s Full Self Driving Coming to Terms with Waymo The vision of Autonomy and how meaningful it will be for people too old to drive Tesla full self driving accidents; still better than most human drivers Software patching feels intrinsically like a band-aid, not part of a complete coherent strategy Aicas software, allowing AI to decide what the car records (and what it chooses to forget !?!) McKinsey and Aidas use different language to describe the same thing A Cruise robotaxi runs someone over and doesn’t stop  The concept of the abstraction layer to allow data interoperability Covesa and the importance of standards in engineering Data Silos within car companies Johannes Biermann the Aicas presenter has same mannerisms as 90s English comic Harry Hill Venom - Countess Bathory NXP Aicas’ parent/partner, Aicas runs on NXP boxes It is about making money from selling data. Not seats, motors or great styling. Not something owners do any maintenance on. A laptop, not a Norton Amon Amarth - Pursuit of Vikings “You guys do the plumbing, but you’re not responsible for what is flushed” - Aicas are selling the shovels of the data sales gold rush “A zoned architecture is developing” Both presenters use the same generic image to illustrate the Software Defined Car Marduk - Into Crypt of Rays (Celtic Frost cover) Over the Airwaves upgrades are more than a software partch for your laptop. They change the AI decision making parameters, and this will happen over night without you even knowing about it. Control of driving is utterly ceeded to the car and its software !!! The structure to make money from the data is taking shape, even as ownership and security of said data remains totally opaque Venom - Black Metal ===== (Oo---x---oO) ===== The Motoring Podcast Network : Years of racing, wrenching and Motorsports experience brings together a top notch collection of knowledge, stories and information. #everyonehasastory #gtmbreakfix - motoringpodcast.net More Information: https://www.motoringpodcast.net/ Become a VIP at: https://www.patreon.com/gtmotorsports Online Magazine: https://www.gtmotorsports.org/ Copyright Jon Summers, The Motoring Historian. This content is also available via jonsummers.net. This episode is part of the Motoring Podcast Network and has been republished with permission.