Agenda 2024, Day 1 - Tuesday

The automotive industry is undergoing a seismic shift, propelled by the emergence of innovative players such as BYD, Tesla, NIO, and disruptive tech startups. As legacy companies grapple with the pressure of incumbency, they face a pivotal moment in redefining their working models to thrive in the era of digital disruption.

The keynote will commence with a comprehensive comparison of automotive companies across four critical domains: Culture, Technology, Customer Engagement Model, and Business Model. Delving into organizational structures, collaboration strategies, and agility, attendees will gain insights into the fundamental cultural shifts necessary to navigate this evolving landscape. Furthermore, a deep dive into technological aspects, including electrical and electronic architecture, hardware, software, and artificial intelligence, will illuminate the imperative of technological prowess in shaping the future of mobility.

Highlighting the essence of collaboration, the keynote will underscore the importance of forging new working models between OEMs and suppliers. Whether it be adhering to a predefined plan, adapting to dynamic market forces, or fostering innovative partnerships, attendees will glean actionable insights into collaborative frameworks conducive to industry transformation.

Furthermore, architecture challenges and emerging trends, such as centralized and zonal architectures, connectivity, and cloud-first strategies, will be discussed to provide attendees with a forward-looking perspective on architectural evolution.

In conclusion, this keynote promises to ignite discussions, inspire innovation, and chart a course towards a future where automotive electrical and electronic architectures drive unprecedented advancements in mobility.

Challenges in the direction of sustainability, political stability, time to market and economic change lead to need for reviewing of the current wiring harness production philosophy.

The automated wiring harness production is a powerful solution to address those topics. In order to implement this scenario, there is a need for a common industry wide focus and standardization as an end-to-end enabler.

Why do cars drive further with flexible circuits?

This lecture deals with the topic of contacting flexible circuits. This is an old technique that has found its way in the e-mobility. Due to a lack of space in the electric vehicles, the standard cabling needs too much space. So very thin flexible circuits are used.

In the lecture I want to put the following points in the spotlight:

• Introduction to contact flexible circuits (foils, tissues, ...)
• Types of flexible circuits and the application area
• Types of contacts
• The 'crimp' method of contacts
• Push in the connector housing
• Quality assessment
• Short representation of conventional cabling compared to flexible lines

Power and signal distribution, better known as wiring, is the nervous system of every vehicle.  From the early days of basic electrical content, features have been added causing wiring to grow in complexity, cost and manufacturing sophistication. The modules that supply the vehicle’s processing needs, known as “electrical architecture”, are coupled with wiring, known as the “physical architecture”.  Together they enable the fully functional vehicle. For decades, the physical architecture has been mostly partitioned according to vehicle subsystem. These subsystems include IP, body, chassis, front compartment (or engine), overhead, and front and rear fascia (bumper). The wiring for these subsystems were assembled in the plant along with their mechanical components to complete the vehicle. 

Recently released vehicles have abandoned traditional design practices.   There are several different variations found in the marketplace.  Each is closely coupled to their electrical architecture.   How does the migration to central compute platforms impact these designs?  What is the rate of change in marketplace?  How are manufacturing hardpoints being overcome?   Caresoft Global Technologies has benchmarked multiple vehicles over the past five years thereby gaining understanding of the industry trends.  These changes in the industry will significantly impact wiring designs, the roles of the wiring suppliers, their profit pipeline and expectations of service at the OEMs.  The changes will be significant and potentially very costly to the business model.  The trends are clear and unavoidable.  These changes and their impacts are explored during this session.