Interview with Dr Moritz Neukirchner, Elektrobit
“We see a strong trend toward open-source solutions”
Dr Moritz Neukirchner studied Electrical Engineering at the Technical University of Braunschweig.
Stefan Deutsch
As budgets tighten across the automotive industry, reaching “SDV Level 5” requires smarter architectures, selective transformation, and collaboration. Dr Moritz Neukirchner of Elektrobit explains how this can be achieved.
Dr Moritz Neukirchner has spent more than a decade shaping
the future of automotive software at Elektrobit, where he currently serves as
Head of Architecture. Before joining Elektrobit, he worked as an engineer at
IAV, combining deep technical expertise with strategic leadership in
software and systems design.
At the Automotive Computing
Conference 2025, Neukirchner will discuss what it truly takes to reach
“SDV Level 5” in times of shrinking budgets – and how focused architectures,
lean processes, and targeted collaboration can turn financial pressure into a
driver of innovation. In the run-up to the conference, we spoke with him about
how OEMs can advance software-defined maturity without losing efficiency or
control.
ADT: Many OEMs talk about reaching “SDV Level 5”, but financial and organizational
realities often slow progress. From your perspective, what are the most
effective ways to advance SDV maturity under tight budgets?
Dr Neukirchner: Most importantly, it is essential to
understand where the Software-Defined Vehicle creates value for the customer.
What does the customer perceive as an SDV? Which features does the customer
want to see delivered via software upgrades over the air? Are there specific
domains where the customer expects the vehicle to improve with age rather than
just get older? The next step for the OEM is to limit changes to architecture
and processes to exactly those parts of the system that deliver this SDV value.
For many OEMs, this will be mostly limited to the cockpit domain. For
everything else, it is important to abstract any existing legacy architecture
from this frequently changing component. Changes to the rest of the system –
that is, the legacy E/E architecture – are only required to save costs, for
example by transitioning to a zonal architecture.
In this way, you can separate the “SDV value zone,” which differentiates the
vehicle on the market, from the “SDV cost zone,” which implements architectural
changes to save costs.
At the ACC 2025, you will
outline strategies and architectures for efficient SDV development. What
practical lessons has Elektrobit learned from working across different OEM
ecosystems, and where do you see the biggest leverage for collaboration?
The biggest leverage is achieved by focusing on what
customers really want and limiting the scope of changes to legacy architectures
to those truly effective in realizing that change. We have seen several OEMs
attempting to establish full upgradeability across all types of electronic
control units. This required tremendous effort, had little effect on customer
perception, and significantly increased project execution risk, as many parts
of the overall system were changing concurrently. Another major cause of cost
escalation was the handling of variants and versions. Being able to scale the
cost of a platform across different vehicle price points and maintaining fewer
versions of the same software platform significantly decreases the total cost
of ownership. However, this is difficult to achieve when managers responsible
for sourcing are in control of only one specific ECU for one specific vehicle
generation – they simply cannot realize the cost benefits over time.
Given these cost and coordination challenges, how can
OEMs and suppliers better align their strategies to balance individual control
with the benefits of shared development?
Both points lead to the biggest opportunity for
collaboration. Once the focus shifts from technology to customer benefit and
from bill-of-material cost to total cost of ownership, it becomes relatively
straightforward to decide where to collaborate and where to pursue exclusive
control. This, however, differs between OEMs and their respective customer
bases. The other aspect of collaboration is its form. Today, we see a strong
trend toward open-source solutions rather than open standards or proprietary ones.
The reason is the perceived greater freedom to influence development and
maintain control over the supply chain. However, other forms of collaboration,
such as proprietary partnerships, may deliver faster results. I believe that
open-source solutions will become more common, but re-developing all available
assets is neither cost-efficient nor faster.
Elektrobit is known for its deep expertise in automotive
software platforms. How does your team balance innovation speed with safety,
compliance, and long-term maintainability in such complex architectures?
The key is to manage versions and variants over time and to
be able to replicate platform builds. You cannot treat software deliveries as
one-offs when you build software products, as Elektrobit does. We have been
delivering software products, including the required safety and compliance, to
our customers for decades. A well-established software development and
qualification setup is key to repetitive business across multiple customers. At
the same time, small teams must be able to work independently on innovative
features. This is characteristic of our deployment of cloud-based development
tools. Utilizing small, agile “speedboats” to test new technologies quickly, in
parallel with more stringent development practices, is absolutely essential to
the concept of failing fast.
