Disruptive technologies have the potential to change
markets dramatically. In such a situation, market
dominance can be achieved particularly by companies
that have newly entered the market or that cut themselves
free from traditional structures and implement
major innovations without hesitation. Electromobility
is such a disruptive change. But electric drives for cars
are only the catalyst for the real change: most significantly,
the architecture and role of information and
communication technology (ICT architecture) will
change for the vehicle of the future. ICT is growing
increasingly important and will come to drive developments
itself.

ICT, in the form of electrics and electronics in cars
(automotive E/E), is already essential to the competitiveness
of the German automotive industry. Its most
notable effects are to improve driving performance
and comfort, and to enhance both passive and active
safety. But the effects go further in electric vehicles.
Here ICT becomes the foundation of the driving functions
themselves. For that reason, architectures and
technologies for vehicle ICT cannot be viewed merely
as a frame for gradual evolutionary innovations, as
they were before. Instead, they must be revised so farsightedly
that they can perform their indispensable
future role in the revolutionary evolution of the automobile.

Electromobility has a double impact. First, it necessitates
a new ICT architecture in cars. But at the same
time it opens up the opportunity for such a revolutionary
architecture for the first time. It shifts the necessary
core competences, lowers barriers to market entry,
and thus changes the market’s rules of the game.
With a new ICT architecture, a newcomer can rise
more easily from the low-cost to the premium segment
of electromobility than a business in the premium
segment can switch from conventional non-electromobility
ICT architecture to the future architecture
that includes electromobility. Consequently new competitors
have a chance to penetrate into established,
saturated markets.

The importance of future ICT architecture goes far beyond
the change to electromobility. For historical reasons,
the conventional architecture is highly complex.
For that reason, it is more and more becoming an impediment
to innovation, instead of an innovation
driver. By contrast, a new architecture will make new
approaches and functions possible – from greater autonomy
in driving to a fuller integration of the vehicle
into the ICT infrastructure – and thus help significantly
to achieve sociopolitical goals like energy efficiency
or lower accident rates.

Electromobility will make information and communication
technology in cars much more important. That
will have far-reaching effects on Germany as a business
location. Skills and competences will shift, and
structures for adding value will change. No doubt
there will also inevitably be a certain amount of selfcannibalization
within the automotive industry. For
that reason, business, science and education, together
with government, must cooperate in a concerted action
to safeguard Germany’s competitiveness in one of
its core industries.

This document is a summary of the results of the “eCar
ICT System Architecture for Electromobility” research
project sponsored by the Federal Ministry of Economics
and Technology. It describes the role of ICT
architecture in a vehicle within the context of electromobility.
It names the main societal and technological
driving forces, and on that basis points out scenarios
for electric vehicles and features of future ICT architectures.
It also discusses the resulting changes in the
value chain in the automotive sector. Based on all results,
the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and
threats are listed (SWOT analysis), with consequent
recommendations for action in government, industry
and science.

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