Electric vehicle technology, autonomous vehicles, and the increasing sophistication of modern-day vehicle subsystems present a myriad of test and challenges for design engineers. Some of these issues will be the focus of several Drive World sessions at the DesignCon Show and Conference at the Santa Clara Convention Center, January 31 through February 2. All the vehicle-related sessions will take place in Ballroom C.

On Wednesday, February 1, the Drive World sessions kick off with “Wiring the Future of Mobility,” from 9:00 am to 9:45 am. This session tackles the Open Alliance TC9 Channel and component spec, which looks at vehicle wiring.

With more vehicles incorporating ADAS, the number of sensors has increased. In turn, this is posing issues with signal integrity, electromagnetic compatibility, and security. A session titled, “More Relevant Than Ever; Safety and Security for Automotive Sensing Systems,” will explore these problems. This session will take place Wednesday, February 1, from 11:15 am to 12 noon.

Following that session, well-known embedded expert Jacob Beningo will delve into automotive controllers in a session titled, “Designing a Configurable ECU with Python.” Beningo will look into how to develop a Python tool that can automatically generate C code for an electronic controller. This session will place Wednesday, February 1, from 12:15 pm to 1 pm.

Related:Increasing Electronics Content Turns Automobiles into a Test Maze

Later in the afternoon, from 2:00 to 2:45 pm, there will be a session titled “4K eDP Vehicular Display Micro-Coax Cable Designs.” This talk will discuss another automotive industry design trend, the movement to 4K eDP display resolution to mitigate screen door effects still seen in Full-HD display resolution. The session will discuss the coaxial interconnect requirements needed to achieve good signal integrity and impedance control.

Addressing Data Issues

Several vehicle-related sessions are on tap for Thursday, February 2. From 8:00 to 8:45 am, there will be a session titled, “Centralized Storage for Next Generation Vehicles: New Standards & Future Roadmaps.” This talk will discuss the new JEDEC JESD312 Automotive SSD standard and how it could address the increasing amount of data in vehicles. The talk will also look at other data concepts such as CXL.

Immediately following that session, at 9:00 am there is a session titled, “Beyond 10Gbps Automotive Ethernet: Is Optical Connectivity the Solution?” This talk will examine how whether the use of optical interconnects in place of the familiar copper-based Ethernet now in vehicles will address signal-related issues such as signal integrity and electromagnetic compatibility.

Related:Automotive Steer-By-Wire Comes of Age at CES 2023

Automotive Ethernet is also the focus of an 11:15 am session titled, “Feasibility of End-to-End Ethernet for Sensor & Display Connectivity in Automotive Applications.” This session discusses a new approach towards the feasibility of an end-to-end Ethernet solution for sensor & display connectivity. The approach combines a purpose-built physical layer with the maturity of Ethernet protocols resulting in a highly optimized and flexible framework, paving the way for homogenous network architecture of software-defined vehicles.

Finally, at 4:15 pm, there will be a panel discussion titled “Test on Wheels: Test & Measurement for Automotive Standards.” The successor to last year’s session, this year’s talk will examine some of the progress in automotive test standards, looking at topics such as SERDES, where some participants in this technology will discuss the early progress in implementing test solutions and what challenges lie ahead.

For a complete list of technical and panel sessions at Design Con, go here.

Spencer Chin is a Senior Editor for Design News covering the electronics beat. He has many years of experience covering developments in components, semiconductors, subsystems, power, and other facets of electronics from both a business/supply-chain and technology perspective. He can be reached at [email protected].