Continental and AWS unveil cloud-based automotive software

German car parts supplier Continental is collaborating with Amazon Web Services (AWS) to develop modular automotive software.

Dubbed Continental Automotive Edge (CAEdge), the new platform connects ground vehicles to the cloud. The tool also features a virtual workbench that offers many options for developing, delivering, and maintaining software-intensive system functions. Furthermore, the workbench allows drivers to download convenient and easy software updates for the functions they want.

“Software is at the forefront of innovation in cars,” said Dirk Abendroth, Continental Automotive’s CTO.

“With our CAEdge platform, we are establishing a new approach to developing vehicle architectures and software in the automotive industry. We have found a strong collaborator in AWS to help us accomplish this task and will continue to expand our leading role in the field of automotive software,” Abendroth added.

A key component of the project includes importing camera and radar data from a vehicle fleet into the CAEdge platform, which will then be used for highly automated driving simulations.

In addition to processing vast amounts of vehicular data, CAEdge supports all steps in developing highly automated and autonomous driving systems, including sensor data collection, model training, and virtual simulations.

Essentially, individual development steps that used to take several weeks now take a few hours. The computing power provided by AWS and machine learning makes this possible.

Customers will also have access to AWS data centers and an AWS network that protects personal information, identifiers, applications, and devices. Along these lines, Continental and AWS are training approximately 1,000 of Continental’s 20,000 software and IT experts in cloud technologies built on AWS, specifically machine learning.

“Continental is providing the mobility experts and its in-depth understanding of the automotive sector, while AWS – as the leading provider of cloud computing – is bringing with it access to the latest machine learning and other innovative cloud services,” commented Bill Vass, vice president of engineering at AWS.

“Backed by the expertise of Continental and its customers, we are creating a development environment that will speed up the development of highly automated and autonomous driving systems,” Vass continued.