Dive Brief:
- General Motors is joining the Connected Vehicle Systems Alliance, a global organization focused on creating open standards and technologies to accelerate the development of connected vehicle systems, the company announced in a press release.
- GM is contributing a vehicle services definition called “uServices,” which will be available to the open-source developer community to help GM create standardized software interfaces for its future vehicles and reduce engineering costs.
- For automakers like GM, managing vehicle data and vehicle-to-cloud connectivity is a high priority as they prepare to launch more software-defined vehicles that support over-the-air updates over the vehicle’s service life.
Dive Insight:
By tapping into the open-source software community, GM aims to speed up development of vehicle software, as well as offer better in-vehicle technology choices to its customers.
GM says it will contribute uServices to Covesa throughout October 2023, adding to the program as it is developed.
For software developers, uServices serves as a standard application programming interface to create vehicle services as part of GM’s connected vehicle ecosystem.
The development of standardized interfaces will allow secure access to vehicle systems from anywhere in an OEM’s vehicle ecosystem, according to the press release. This standardized interface supports the development of distributed software that can help GM manage a future fleet of millions of software-defined vehicles.
“General Motors intends to play a leading role in unifying a global community of creative developers while reducing the time it takes for the industry, from automotive manufacturers to suppliers, to develop and integrate these features,” said Frank Ghenassia, executive chief architect of software defined vehicles at General Motors.
Tesla pioneered building vehicles that are more like smartphones, but now legacy automakers are making plans to transition to software-based vehicles that support over-the-air software updates.
GM's move to join Covesa follows a similar announcement this spring. In April, GM said it was joining the Eclipse Foundation and its Software Defined Vehicle Working Group, which is focused on the development of open-source software used to interface with vehicles remotely, such as vehicle companion apps for mobile devices.
GM also announced its Ultifi end-to-end vehicle software platform in September 2021, which will underpin its future vehicles. According to GM, Ultifi will enable the delivery of third-party apps and services that customers can add to their vehicles via over-the-air software updates. Collaborators on Ultifi include Microsoft and Red Hat.
Ultifi’s vehicle software platform is similar to an Android-powered smartphone, using an open-source operating system that allows developers to create apps and other features that can run on it. Ultifi allows GM to give authorized third-party developers access to its vehicles to create software on behalf of its customers.
The Ultifi platform is designed to allow future GM customers to add features, functions or personalization options to their vehicles, which can generate new revenue streams for GM. For example, drivers could pay a monthly subscription for GM’s Super Cruise automated driving feature.
Another potential use of the Ultifi software platform is the ability to unlock settings to improve vehicle performance, such as increasing the power output of an electric vehicle by paying a monthly fee.
GM projects that annual revenue from vehicle software and services could reach $20 billion to $25 billion by the end of the decade, when it expects to have up to 30 million software-based vehicles on the road.
