Bosch wins orders worth billions for computers for automotive applications

28 December: Bosch has now won orders worth several billion euros for its vehicle computers – 2.5 billion euros’ worth since this past summer alone. Bosch is developing vehicle computers for all automotive applications. In fact, vehicles featuring Bosch central computers have been on the roads since 2019. The market for these systems is worth some 20 billion euros, and is set to grow 15% annually between now and 2030.

In the years ahead, vehicle computers will be entrusted with tasks from different parts of the vehicle or domains, as the experts call them. When this happens, just one central computer will be responsible for controlling not only vehicle motion, but also body electronics. In modern cars, intelligence counts for a lot. Vehicle computers are the key to significantly reducing the complexity of electronic systems.

Bosch vehicle computers have been controlling functions such as driver assistance systems and motion in production vehicles. And soon, they will be joined by central computers for cockpit functions and body electronics. These computers, the new all-rounders of automotive electronics, are incorporating ever more functions of individual control units into central, highly powerful electronic modules.

“Vehicle computers have huge business potential for Bosch. Even now, our high-performance computers mean that automakers view us as one of their leading engineering and technology partners,” says Harald Kroeger, who sits on the board of management of Robert Bosch GmbH.

The new Cross-Domain Computing Solutions division and its 17,000 associates will start operations in January 2021. In this unit, Bosch is bringing together its hardware and software engineering for vehicle computers, sensors, and control units for all vehicle domains.

In the future, high-performance control units will be a must-have for all cars. These central nodes are where all the car’s “nerves” converge. According to McKinsey, software’s share in the value of a vehicle will rise from just 10% today to 30% in the future.

In the next vehicle generation, it will assume the tasks done by as many as ten control units. Some vehicles now feature more than 100 control units in total, and this development will allow automakers to significantly reduce this number.