PARIS (Reuters) – Stellantis announced on Tuesday that it had developed a “virtual cockpit” using Amazon’s computing power and BlackBerry technology to create and test new versions of automotive controls and systems in just one day, compared to several months so far.
In a press release published from Las Vegas, in the United States, where the CES technology show opens, the third largest automotive group in the world by turnover says it is now able “to create realistic virtual versions of controls and systems of vehicles, capable of behaving like a real car, but without changing the main software that makes them work.”
According to Stellantis, this reduces development time to only “24 hours in certain cases”, whereas today it is measured in months.
The group born from the merger between PSA and FCA announced in 2022 a partnership with Amazon in order to use Amazon Web Services to develop software-based products for its vehicles and provide regular updates remotely.
“With our virtual cockpit, we are revolutionizing, not only our approach, but also that of our suppliers and partners in the industry,” said Yves Bonnefont, software director at Stellantis, quoted in the press release. “We are able to get closer to the needs of our customers, through this technology, with accelerated development cycles.”
In a world where cars increasingly resemble smartphones on wheels, historic car manufacturers face strong technological pressure from new electric entrants like Tesla, but also from Chinese brands capable of drastically reducing the time required to design and bring new models to market.
By using the tools developed by the Canadian Blackberry, Stellantis also says it is capable of accelerating customer feedback on a given brand and making “real-time changes to optimize use for the driver.”
“This real-time feedback, supported by low latency access to the cloud, allows Stellantis to solicit valuable feedback from its customers and form a development basis for building future infotainment functions and applications” on board , added the manufacturer.
(Report by Gilles Guillaume, with Nick Carey in London, edited by Blandine Hénault)
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