Creating additional value with data-driven services
Developing software applications or functions for vehicles no longer ends with the start of production. The huge amount of valuable data produced by each vehicle during operation can be used to create benefits for manufacturers, suppliers, and drivers alike. Vehicle software developers are looking closer at the entire product life cycle. The result: additional data-driven services that can increase customer satisfaction.
Of course, the development needs a testing phase to validate the functions in real-life scenarios. This part often creates a bottle neck, especially when it comes to collecting, transferring, and analyzing the data from the test vehicles. In a highly competitive market with a demand for short development times, software engineers need a quick and easy way of data exchange and handling. Here, the Bosch Chassis Systems Control division relies on many tools and methodologies, and increasingly on the use of Bosch IoT Insights.
Speeding up software development
Road hazards like potholes have an impact on the passing vehicle and are noticed by various systems already on board. However, additional software applications are needed to interpret the data or translate it into valuable insights. Andreas Hoffmann, System Engineer at Bosch Chassis Systems Control, and his team are working on a road roughness classifier. He explains the importance of Bosch IoT Insights for the development process: “For testing, we set up potholes, speed bumps and the like. We then have a certain number of vehicles drive over them at specific speeds. This way, we can match the data measured by the sensors from our braking systems to the actual road situation. This validation process helps us to adjust our road roughness classifier. This is only possible if we have a powerful software in place to collect, transfer, and analyze the data in nearly real time, providing our engineers with fast and direct insights, even if they are thousands of miles away from the testing range.” Bosch IoT Insights provides all these crucial functions and makes the development faster, easier, and more efficient.
One software application, endless use cases
Once deployed on a large number of vehicles, the road roughness classifier can enable different data-driven services. Andreas Hoffmann explains how the users will benefit: “The collected data of thousands of cars creates a valid picture of the road conditions, so users can be warned of upcoming hazards. But the use cases go far beyond accident-free mobility. They also support automated driving or a better road infrastructure maintenance.”
The team’s previous development – also with the help of Bosch IoT Insights – the road friction estimator, is already used in various types of vehicles and provides valuable data about important weather-dependent road conditions. The combined information from both applications – road friction estimator and road roughness classifier – can be used for intelligent driver assistance services, for example to suggest the safest available route to drivers. And the value creation goes even further: OEMs can use the data for their own services; they can also sell it to third-party service providers and offer it to customers in other industries such as civil engineering or infrastructure planning.
More on Chassis Systems Control
Chassis Systems Control is a division of the Bosch Group. It develops, produces, and sells brake systems, occupant protection systems, and vehicle dynamics sensors. Its brake systems include ABS,
ESP®, vacuum-based brake systems, vacuum-independent brake boosters (iBooster), and combined systems (integrated power brake). Its passenger protection systems encompass airbag control units and the associated crash sensor technology. Vehicle dynamics sensors include the sensors that provide vehicle-related signals as input to active safety systems. In addition, the Brake Components business unit (Buderus Guss GmbH, Breidenbach, Germany) has so far supplied brake discs for passenger cars.