Boss Talk: QNX and Vector Presidents on Simplifying the Complexity of Future Cars

Would you agree, Dietz?

Uh, fully.

So I rem- therefore I laugh.

Uh, before, uh, we started in 2014 at BMW with the case, uh, where alrea- already software was one big portion of it.

And, uh, we started at that time with a so-called, uh, software platform approach, rolled out at, at that time, uh, with the 7 Series in 2015.

And then step by step, we, we, uh, improved, uh, the focus on, on application level on one hand.

But on the other, in all my jobs, we have still a lot of challenges with the underlying software platform.

Mm-hmm.

To have a robust and more evolutionary development in place.

And I think this is the point why, where SDV is changing at the moment so much.

Nowadays, the, the OEMs, especially west- the west, on the western side, they have to focus more and more on what matters most for their customers because they are so much enforced by the Chinese, uh, comp- car companies.

Right.

And therefore they have to, yeah, rethink and say, "Okay, the software platform, it's commodity now." There are companies like QNX and Vector and some others who can take care of it, and they can push their capacities from a development perspective to, to the real application developments where their customers are saying, "Hey, this is great stuff.

It's the cutting-edge technology on ADAS, IVI, and so on."

You know, I heard something very, quite recently from, uh, Ford's got this, the Skunk Works program out in Long Beach, very close to our office.

Mm-hmm.

And they're building their next, their ul- their universal EV platform.

And we had a, we had a call, and he was saying that the term SDV now has reached a point where it's almost kind of performative.

It's a little bit of marketing speak.

Like, whereas maybe some car companies are really good at it, but others are not, and they're just sort of mouthing the words.

Do you...

Uh, you're nodding.

You- Is that-

Well, I, I mean, SDV, it's a label.

Okay.