“ISELED is no longer an experimental concept”

As automotive interiors become more digital, networked and software-controlled, lighting is moving closer to displays, sensors, user interfaces and zonal E/E architectures. Robert Isele, General Manager and CEO of Inova Semiconductors, has spent decades in the automotive industry, including at BMW Group, where he worked on display technologies, driver information system architectures and interior lighting. Since the beginning of 2024, he has been leading Inova Semiconductors, a company focused on technologies for advanced display and lighting applications as well as high-speed automotive data transmission.

“The focus is shifting towards the interior experience”

Lighting systems are becoming increasingly complex and connected. Philipp Kolb from Lightworks explains how design, electronics, and optics merge into homogeneous, functional lighting solutions – and why balance and precision are key to the next generation of intelligent in-car lighting.

Benjamin Müller

At the Automotive Lighting Conference in Munich on 30 June 2026, Isele will give an update on the ISELED Alliance and its outlook. Ahead of the event, we spoke with him about why scalable digital lighting is becoming an architectural question, where current vehicle architectures still fall short and how open ecosystems can help bring intelligent lighting into series production.

Looking ahead three to five years, what will be the biggest bottleneck in scaling dynamic digital interior lighting across future vehicle architectures?

The biggest bottleneck will not be the LED component itself. It will be the architecture around it. Dynamic interior lighting is moving from a simple decorative feature to a software-controlled, functional part of the vehicle experience. In future vehicles, lighting will need to interact with displays, sensors, driver-assistance functions, user interfaces and zonal E/E architectures. This requires seamless, reliable and fully transparent communication, synchronization, diagnostics, calibration on the edge across a large number of smart light elements. 

From Inova’s perspective, scalability will depend on whether the industry manages to treat digital lighting as part of the vehicle architecture, rather than as a stand-alone feature added late in each vehicle program. Without standardised building blocks, open interfaces and efficient network concepts, complexity, wiring effort, validation cost and software integration will become limiting factors. Another important aspect is supply-chain robustness. Digital lighting will become a high-volume architectural element, not a niche feature. Therefore, OEMs and Tier 1s need technologies that are not only technically scalable, but also industrially scalable. This is one of the reasons why Inova has built ISELED around a multi-source and ecosystem strategy. Today, our wafer supply is supported by established foundry partners, including GlobalFoundries and Samsung Foundry. 

When Automotive UX Becomes SDV Architecture

In-display sensing, projected surfaces and AR technologies show how automotive UX is moving beyond the interface. What matters now is integration, validation and calibration across the SDV stack – a shift clearly visible in Aumovio’s current concepts.

Benjamin Müller

This gives customers a more resilient supply chain, reduces dependency on a single manufacturing path and supports regional flexibility in a geopolitically more complex world. With more than 500 million ISELED devices already in the field and strong further growth expected, the technology has moved well beyond the proof-of-concept phase. The key question for the next three to five years is therefore not whether digital lighting works, but how the industry scales it reliably across platforms, regions and vehicle segments. Speed makes the difference: ready-to-use components and a strong supply base accelerate time to market.

Which decision being made today will most strongly determine whether interior lighting becomes a standardized architecture element or remains a highly customized feature in each vehicle program?

The key decision is whether OEMs and Tier 1s define digital lighting as an architectural layer with reusable interfaces, or whether they continue to implement it as a highly customized feature for each vehicle program. There will always be OEM-specific differentiation in the lighting experience. That is important and should remain. E/E architecture should be standardized at the zonal level, but the last-mile electronics, communication, diagnostics, calibration and integration should be simple, hardware-defined and plug-and-play-ready. This is exactly where concepts such as ISELED and ILaS can help. 

They provide a system approach for smart, calibrated and individually controllable LEDs, supported by an ecosystem of semiconductor companies, LED manufacturers, Tier 1s, software partners and technology specialists. Standardization at this level does not reduce differentiation. On the contrary, it gives OEMs a scalable foundation on which they can create their own brand-specific lighting experiences. In our view, the industry should be careful not to replace one form of complexity with another. A technically elegant solution is not enough if it creates unnecessary lock-in, limits sourcing flexibility or makes the supply chain less resilient. The stronger approach is an open, alliance-based architecture that allows competition and cooperation at the same time.

Immersive lighting design transforms the vehicle cabin

Lighting in vehicles is evolving beyond pure functionality. Through immersive, emotional and biologically effective concepts, the interior is becoming a personalised experiential space. This transformation is driven by advanced LEDs, lighting artistry and intelligent design.

Benjamin Müller

Where do current lighting and data architectures still fall short when it comes to supporting large numbers of intelligent, individually controlled lighting elements in the vehicle?

Many current architectures were not originally designed for hundreds or even thousands of intelligent, individually controlled light points. As a result, they can become fragmented, wiring-intensive and difficult to scale. The main limitations are communication efficiency, deterministic control, synchronization, diagnostics at component level, EMC robustness, software integration and the ability to update and manage lighting functions over the vehicle lifetime. In many cases, the architecture still treats lighting as a local subsystem rather than as a connected part of the overall digital vehicle. For future interiors, this will no longer be sufficient. 

Lighting will increasingly need to work together with displays, sensors, safety-related signals and user interaction. That requires both smart local control close to the LED and efficient connection to higher-level vehicle networks. There is also a strategic dimension. Architectures that are optimized around a single proprietary component or one closed implementation can be difficult to adapt when requirements, suppliers or regional sourcing strategies change. A more open and modular architecture makes it easier to qualify multiple partners, adapt to regional supply-chain requirements and reduce geopolitical exposure without redesigning the complete lighting system.

What role can ISELED and related network concepts realistically play as interior lighting becomes more dynamic, distributed and software-controlled?

“Light must be developed and conceived holistically”

Digital LEDs and ILaS transform vehicle lighting into a connected, intelligent system. SP3 expert Mathias Rönnfeldt explains how design, electronics, and software merge into dynamic, emotional lighting systems of the next generation.

Benjamin Müller

ISELED and related concepts such as ILaS can play a very practical role. They are not just about controlling RGB LEDs. They provide a scalable system concept for intelligent, calibrated and networked lighting elements. The strength of ISELED is that it reduces system complexity while enabling precise digital control of many individual LEDs. ILaS extends this idea into a broader network approach for lighting and sensor-related applications. This becomes increasingly relevant as interior lighting becomes more dynamic, distributed and connected to software-defined vehicle functions. Realistically, ISELED and ILaS can become important building blocks between the local lighting level and the broader vehicle architecture. They allow the industry to standardize the foundation while still giving OEMs freedom to differentiate through design, software, interaction concepts and brand experience. 

A major advantage of the ISELED Alliance is that it is not built around one company trying to control the complete value chain. It brings together semiconductor companies, LED manufacturers, Tier 1s, design experts, software partners and OEM-facing technology companies. This creates a broad ecosystem rather than a closed island solution. That ecosystem is very important for the automotive industry. OEMs need interoperability, qualified partners, long-term availability and second-source strategies. With a large installed base, strong growth and a broad supplier network, ISELED has effectively become a quasi-industry standard for intelligent digital interior lighting. The role of ISELED and ILaS is therefore not only technical. They provide a proven and scalable foundation that helps the industry move from project-specific implementations to reusable lighting architectures.

How will high-speed automotive data transmission change the relationship between displays, lighting, sensors and zonal architectures in future vehicle interiors?

High-speed automotive data transmission will be one of the key enablers for the future digital vehicle interior. Displays, lighting and sensors are increasingly connected. The interior is becoming an interactive digital space where visual information, ambient light, functional signals, user interaction and sensor feedback need to work together in real time. This cannot be achieved efficiently if every function is treated as a separate island. From Inova’s perspective, the future architecture will combine high-speed data backbones with simple local networks. High-speed transmission technologies such as APXpress can support the move towards scalable data architectures for displays, sensors and zonal systems. 

How Valeo shapes the light of the future

For Valeo, light is much more than safety - it is communication, design, and software all at once. In Bobigny, France, the supplier develops technologies that redefine vehicle lighting.

Timo Gilgen

At the same time, concepts such as ISELED and ILaS can efficiently handle distributed digital lighting functions close to the application. The important point is that lighting, displays and sensors should no longer be considered separately. They will increasingly become part of one coordinated interior experience, enabled by robust and scalable data communication. This is also where architectural openness matters. Future vehicle interiors will evolve over several model generations. OEMs need architectures that allow them to add functions, change suppliers, localize production and react to geopolitical or supply-chain constraints without starting from zero. Open, scalable network concepts are therefore not only a technical advantage, but also a strategic one.

Where should the industry draw the line between standardization for cost and scalability, and OEM-specific differentiation in digital lighting experiences?

The industry should standardize what the end customer does not directly perceive: communication interfaces, diagnostics, basic software integration and electrical robustness. German thoroughness down to the last device does not help here. OEM differentiation should happen where the customer does perceive value: design language, light choreography, personalization, interaction concepts, safety-related visual communication and the overall brand experience. This distinction is important. Standardization should not make lighting experiences look the same. It should make them easier, faster and more cost-efficient to implement. A standardized technical foundation gives OEMs more freedom to innovate at the experience level, because they do not have to solve the same architectural problems again in every program. In addition, standardization should not mean dependence on one closed implementation. 

“Collaboration between academia and industry will lead to striking lighting effects”

Smart lighting and advanced display systems are transforming the vehicle interior into an interactive space. Karlheinz Blankenbach – founder of the Display Lab at Pforzheim University – explains how digital LEDs, metrology, and human visual effects will drive the next wave of intelligent, energy-efficient in-car experiences.

Benjamin Müller

For the automotive industry, real standardization must support a healthy supply chain, multiple qualified partners and long-term availability. This is where an alliance-based approach has clear advantages. It supports competition inside the ecosystem, avoids unnecessary lock-in and gives OEMs more freedom in sourcing and regional manufacturing strategies. In today’s geopolitical environment, this is becoming just as important as technical performance. A technology that is already proven in high volumes, supported by multiple ecosystem partners and manufactured through established foundry sources is much closer to what the automotive industry needs than a proprietary approach that may look attractive technically but creates new dependencies in the supply chain. Another important point is that digital lighting should not be seen only as styling or decoration. It can contribute to comfort, orientation, communication, personalization and safety inside the vehicle. 

To unlock this potential, the industry needs open ecosystems and cooperation across the value chain, from semiconductor companies and LED manufacturers to Tier 1s, software partners and OEMs. This has always been one of the core ideas behind the ISELED Alliance: to create a scalable and interoperable foundation for the next generation of automotive lighting. The maturity of the technology is also important. With more than 500 million devices already in the field, strong further growth and a quality level in the close-to-zero ppb range, ISELED is no longer an experimental concept. It is a proven industrial platform. This combination of ecosystem, field experience, supply-chain resilience and quality performance is why ISELED can be regarded as a quasi-industry standard for software-defined automotive lighting. It gives OEMs and Tier 1s a reliable foundation for innovation without forcing them into a closed or single-source architecture.

US Automotive Wire Harness & EDS Conference

20-21 October 2026 | The Henry Hotel, Dearborn, Michigan