The Digital Transformation Of Automotive And Transport Engineering
Originally published by Bernard Marr on LinkedIn: The Digital Transformation Of Automotive And Transport Engineering
Since its earliest days, the automotive and transport engineering sector has harnessed breakthrough technologies in its mission to move people and products around more efficiently.
In an increasingly data-driven world, where technology is becoming smarter by the day, combining the wealth of information on metrics and measurements with advanced analytics is helping the industry to build transport which is faster, more efficient, and safer to the environment.
I recently attended the UK Intelligent Engineering Forum where leaders were showcasing some of their latest cutting-edge innovations. Here’s a run-through of some of the ideas and technologies which were on show.
A huge challenge faced by the industry is the move away from carbon emissions and the need for less polluting methods of transport, particularly in urban areas.
With many cities around the world considering banning private cars from city centres, the focus for engineers is on producing cleaner and more environmentally friendly methods of transport.
One of the highlights of the event was a presentation by Integral Powertrain technical director Luke Barker.
Founded by four engineers who originally came together at Cosworth, Integral Powertrain now supplies the electric power mechanisms used in some of the most popular, as well as the most exotic, electric cars and vehicles from leading manufacturers.
In his keynote speech, Barker highlighted the transformative effect on engineering processes which has come about due to fundamental changes to vehicle and engine design in recent years.
While a modern internal combustion engine can have many moving parts, an electric motor often has just one, although the switches which modulate voltage across the motor’s terminals have to operate between 10,000 and 100,000 times a second.
The precision necessary to operate at this speed means the challenge shifts from mechanical to software engineering, requiring a very different toolset and skillset of the engineers designing and building them.
“It’s only now just becoming possible to have software which can operate well at that speed,” he said.
He also predicted that the trend for building exotic and niche vehicles with this technology will continue, while mainstream consumer model adoption is slightly further down the road.
“Following that, a major shift in high volume industry, which is going to be pretty painful – and will take up a lot of time and effort to deliver the amount of cars needed at low cost and in large volumes,” he said.
Lightyear is a potentially highly disruptive startup showcasing its Lightyear One solar powered electric vehicle.
The Lightyear car is powered by solar panels which charge the vehicle whenever there is sunlight. They say it will be capable of driving indefinitely at a speed of 65 km/h while in sunlight, and the battery has a capacity which will allow a range of 400 to 500 miles without sun, once it is fully charged.
Ideas like this – if the team can pull of the engineering challenge, which founder Lex Hoefsloot described as “on the verge of the impossible”, could be key to solving the “chicken and egg” problem inherent with electric vehicle uptake. Many drivers are currently unwilling to switch to electric due to a lack of charging points, while charging points won’t be deployed in large numbers until more electric vehicles are on the road.
A car which charges itself without a petrol or diesel engine could revolutionise the automotive industry if the technology can be mass produced at a consumer scale.
Hoefsloot highlighted the move of the windscreen washing nozzles from the body of the car to the wiper blades themselves. The aerodynamic improvement increases the efficiency of the vehicle – essential for conserving power use – and though it might seem like a minor change its an example of small engineering innovations which could add up to big improvements in performance.
The digital transformation journeys of Integral Powertrain and Lightyear, have both been supported and enabled by the same Product Lifecycle Management (PLM) solution, the 3DEXPERIENCE platform from Dassault Systèmes, which provides software solutions for a range of functions - from Marketing to Sales, to Engineering and Purchasing - offering 3D design, analysis, simulation, business process, and intelligence software in a collaborative, interactive environment.
Intrinsys, the UK’s largest Dassault Systèmes Business Partner, served as implementation partner on both projects, delivering the software, services, training and consulting support in order to ensure successful transformation towards fully digitalised processes.
Other manufacturers have shown that the focus is very much on a shift away from traditional vehicle design and towards the production of “mobility services”. As has happened in the tech industry, automotive manufacturers are positioning themselves to move from offering products (for example cars) towards services, designed to efficiently move goods or people around their environments.
Two of the biggest manufacturers of personal vehicles – GM in the US and Toyota in Japan, have unveiled initiatives in this area. Toyota’s E-Palette is designed for anything from ride sharing in urban areas to delivering pizzas. And GM has shown its commitment to moving in this direction through its Maven app, which puts a fleet of ride-sharing and rental vehicles at its user’s fingertips.
One effect of a move away from personal vehicle ownership is likely to be a large reduction in the overall number of vehicles which are produced. As Jonathan Dutton of Dassault Systèmes pointed out in his keynote, the average privately owned car is used very inefficiently, spending most of its life parked and unused. A shift towards fleets of shared vehicles used “as-a-service” will have huge ramifications across the vehicle production industry.
It’s clear that the auto industry is continuing its long history of pushing the boundaries of what can be done with the technology which is available.
At the same time, the industry is adapting to the changing needs of the consumer – from a desire for more environmentally friendly forms of transport, to a move away from the idea of expensive and inefficient personal car ownership.
Whether these ideas catch on is likely to be down to whether this pioneering spirit can be balanced with the need to produce affordable products and services which can be cost-efficiently manufactured in large numbers.
If it’s done right, the streets and highways of the world could look, sound and smell very different within the next 10 years.
If you would like to see any of this in action then why not join them at the PLM Innovation Forum on July 4th, http://plmif.org/.
Thank you for reading my post. Here at LinkedIn and at Forbes I regularly write about management, technology and Big Data. If you would like to read my future posts then simply join my network here or click 'Follow'. Also feel free to connect on Twitter, Facebook or Slideshare.
Also, you might like to read more about how data and analytics are transforming HR in Data-Driven HR. It’s packed with real-life examples and practical ways HR teams can deliver maximum value in our increasingly data-driven world.
And if you want something to read now, then you could check out my my new and free ebook 'The 9 tech mega-trends that are shaping our world'.
