NXP Launches Open S32 CoreRide Platform for Software-Defined Vehicles
Today, NXP announced a new platform and automotive processor that promises more integration and utility in SDVs—no matter the architecture.
NXP today introduced its Open S32 CoreRide Platform, an integrated and scalable solution to address the current development hurdles for software-defined vehicles (SDVs). This platform announcement, coupled with the announcement of a new super-integrated automotive processor, offers designers a ground-up solution to SDV development for a variety of vehicle architectures.
The Open S32 CoreRide Platform offers designers an integrated and versatile platform to speed up development times and improve functionality for SDVs.
To learn more about the Open S32 CoreRide platform, we spoke with Ray Cornyn, NXP's SVP and GM of vehicle control and networking solutions, and the company's global marketing director Brian Carlson, to discuss what sets the CoreRide platform apart in today’s automotive landscape and how the newest NXP devices are poised to benefit SDV designers.
CoreRide Pre-Integrates Hardware and Software for SDVs
A major issue in developing SDVs is the relatively fractured development cycle in today’s automobiles. The presence of many unique electronic control units (ECUs) in modern vehicles prevents flexibility and scalability and can make vehicle software design equally difficult.
NXP's CoreRide platform can be used in many different vehicle architectures without compromising performance. By collaborating with OEMs, Tier 1s, and software partners, NXP designed the CoreRide platform to help designers get SDVs up and running by allowing them to focus solely on their own novelty and value propositions.
The CoreRide platform is built to make porting functionality to different zones/domains easy by unifying the development environment across the vehicle.
“We realize that our portfolio and our solutions must cover all of the different architectures in today’s modern vehicles,” Cornyn said. “With our CoreRide platform, we can offer the hardware and software that supports easy development across all of those different architectures and software bases.”
The New S32N Offers Super-Central Processing
Along with the CoreRide announcement, NXP also revealed the S32N series of “super-integration” processors. As mentioned above, SDV solutions must accommodate all vehicle architectures, including those where all processing is done in a central ECU. NXP claims the S32N provides a high performance in these cases.
While NXP has not yet released many details about the S32N series, the company has confirmed that the family can support mixed criticality functions in one device while also providing a high degree of isolation to meet automotive safety standards. The S32N family also includes hardware security features, built-in Ethernet and CAN support, potential AI/ML acceleration, and PCIe support.
The S32N central processor offers enough performance to remove the need for multiple ECUs and adopt a fully centralized architecture for SDVs.
With the S32N and CoreRide platform, designers can move software from one ECU to another with nearly the same ease as cutting and pasting. Putting all that into perspective, Cornyn says it's all about flexibility.
“The CoreRide platform is designed so that applications written for those zones can be easily picked up and placed into a central computing processor. We see that as a major additional flexibility that we’ve been able to add into the architecture.”
NXP Supports Collaboration and Central Compute
While it is still too early to compare the quantitative performance benefits of the S32N and the CoreRide platform, the move to an open and collaborative ecosystem can benefit many automotive designers.
“There is a broad range of things we’re seeing happening in central compute, including centralization of data intelligence, vehicle data intelligence, and machine learning,” Carlson remarked. “The S32N family addresses all of these central compute applications we see coming.”
More information is available at this NXP blog on the S32N processors.
All images used courtesy of NXP.
