Tian Yajun believes that FOTA should be ranked first, because this technology not only shines in the field of pure electric vehicles this year, but also has begun to expand to the field of fuel vehicles. At the same time, most people have not realized what revolutionary changes it will bring to the automobile and even the whole automobile industry. So today we're going to talk about FOTA.
Before talking about FOTA, let's talk about the broader OTA.
The literal meaning of OTA is straightforward, Over? That? Air is to upgrade computers, mobile phones and other electronic devices through air (wireless).
Many years ago, if we had to upgrade the firmware or software of electronic equipment, we usually took great pains. Many boys should have installed systems for girls' computers. Before connecting the new system to the computer for installation, it must be "burned" to a CD or USB flash drive. In the era of functional machines and the early development of smart phones, many people have been happy to brush all kinds of firmware on their mobile phones.
The only benefit of this cumbersome upgrade method may be to help many boys who know computers solve the single problem.
After the popularization of 4G mobile network, equipment manufacturers can package the latest optimized system or firmware directly to users' devices, such as computers and smart phones today. Everyone may have received a prompt like "The system has been updated, click to confirm the update", click, restart, wait for the upgrade, and then you can enjoy some new functions or solve some bugs. This is the benefit of OTA.
The principle of auT-BOXmobile OTA is very similar to these. As early as the beginning of this century, car companies have upgraded T-box. A SIM card will be installed in this T-box, and the central control system of the vehicle can transmit information such as road rescue and customer service consultation through limited network speed. Later, hardware-related operations such as remote control of door and window air conditioning were developed to improve the convenience of automobile use, but due to the limitation of bandwidth and technology, it was limited to some simple operations.
This upgrade has a special name in the automotive field, called SOTA, where S stands for software. As the name implies, SOTA is to update the software in the car through the network, such as maps and music, so that the owner can enjoy the latest version of the software system.
SOTA is the most so-called "smart car" on the market at present, but FOTA is different.
The f of FOTA stands for firmware. Based on SOTA, FOTA can also update the vehicle firmware system through the network, including but not limited to the control system that controls the core components such as engine/motor, gearbox and chassis suspension. In other words, in the past, we needed to go to 4S stores to upgrade highly professional systems, which could be done in the garage, on the roadside or even while driving through the FOTA function.
This firmware level update is also called "on-board OTA" on PPT of many manufacturers.
The emergence of FOTA not only saves you from going to 4S stores, but also has a subversive impact on the traditional automobile industry.
On the one hand, FOTA allows vehicles to continuously and conveniently obtain the functional updates of manufacturers after leaving the factory, just like mobile phones, but more importantly, it completely changes the sales methods of vehicles in the past.
In this respect, Tesla, the originator of automobile FOTA, is the most typical case.
Tesla's first production Model model? s？ It was launched as early as 20 12. According to the traditional car manufacturer's gameplay, this car basically does not need to be updated except for some troubleshooting. After a few years, it can continue to launch new products, back and forth. But after the listing, the model? S car owners basically receive some updates every few months, and some even change more than the replacement models of many traditional manufacturers.
For example, 20 15 has been on the market for more than three years, and Tesla adopts OTA as the model? s？ Pushed? Autopilot? 7.0? Version, add automatic steering, automatic emergency steering, side collision warning, automatic lane change, automatic parking and other heavy assisted driving functions.
2065438+2008 Mangosteen Hurricane is coming, what's Tesla's impact on China's 60kwh south China? Tesla model battery version upgrade passed? Ota? Temporarily enable users to obtain more battery capacity.
20 19 Tesla even optimizes motor control through OTA and makes models? The maximum power of S is increased by 50? Horsepower, so in Porsche? Tekan? Turbocharged? S PK turned defeat into victory.
You may have noticed that a very important feature of this game is that the hardware supporting these "new functions" is actually "embedded" in advance. For example, when the vehicle goes on the market, a certain function of the vehicle is in a conservative low-performance state, but when the software is ready, the function potential can be "released" through the update of FOTA.
Furthermore, manufacturers can also turn on or off some unique selling points, so that users can temporarily "unlock" a high-profile function, even a function that may be equipped in the future. If they are satisfied, they can pay, if they are not satisfied, they can close it.
That's how Tesla plays.
Today in September, as the weather turns cold, Tesla's 2400 yuan online activation of the heating function of the rear seat of the vehicle to the domestic Model3 owners has caused heated discussion. Tesla even started preparing for FSD this year. Monthly payment service is available at any time. Many people think that it is not very kind for Tesla to let customers pay for the hardware they have already purchased, but in fact this is a new gameplay brought by FOTA.
With the support of FOTA, automobile manufacturers can only provide one version of production models in the future, which will minimize the procurement and production costs of vehicles and shorten the delivery time by times. On the one hand, we can dilute the extra equipment cost with larger purchases, and on the other hand, we can earn higher profits by paying for activation later. For consumers, if they are not satisfied with the performance of low-equipped vehicles after buying a car, they can easily pay the upgrade fee without being bothered by their own mistakes.
Because of the appearance of FOTA, Tianyajun won't be surprised if the automobile retail industry completely transforms from hardware business to software industry in the near future, and even becomes a part of the advertising industry like TV.
Perhaps it is precisely because of the infinite imagination brought by FOTA that this function has become an indispensable page on PPT of almost all electric vehicle companies. For example, Wei Lai, Tucki, etc. All companies learn from Tesla, put a separate price tag on their driver assistance system, and constantly upgrade through FOTA.
Seeing this, you may also find a problem: regardless of Tesla or several new domestic car-making forces, the current promotion of FOTA functions is basically electric vehicle manufacturers. Why is the FOTA function rarely heard in the field of fuel vehicles?
From a technical point of view, the technical framework of traditional fuel vehicles and FOTA technology are indeed a bit "inconsistent".
As we all know, there are tens of thousands of internal parts of traditional fuel vehicles, including hundreds of modules such as engines and gearboxes, which can be controlled by ECU (Electronic Control Unit). Frequently controlling so many ecus through FOTA will require high transmission speed of vehicle-mounted network. Sadly, CANbus, which is widely used in traditional vehicle internal information transmission at present, has high reliability, but its transmission speed is the level of the last century, which obviously cannot meet the massive and frequent data transmission of FOTA.
What's more sad is that the traditional ECU control scheme on fuel vehicles is mostly packaged by suppliers, while FOTA update is dominated by automobile manufacturers, so it is necessary to transfer the software development work originally controlled by suppliers to automobile manufacturers, which brings challenges to the original development model and the technical level of automobile manufacturers.
Then, in the face of subversive technology like FOTA, can fuel vehicles only watch pure electric vehicles ride the dust? You know, according to the prediction of the International Energy Agency, by 2050, more than 50% of the cars in the world will still be equipped with internal combustion engines.
The answer is of course no.
Recently, Geely announced that Xingrui, a newly listed fuel vehicle, has undergone the second FOTA upgrade after listing, and has made a number of upgrades and optimizations to the infotainment sector.
This upgrade is less than two weeks from the first FOTA upgrade during the Guangzhou Auto Show. In that upgrade, Xingrui added RPA remote automatic parking function, optimized the transparent compensation display effect of the blind area of 540 panoramic image, and adjusted the idle speed of the heat engine from 900 rpm to 750 rpm in sports mode, thus improving the NVH performance of the engine. Most of these functions can only be realized by upgrading in 4S stores.
Geely Xingrui thus became the first fuel vehicle to complete the FOTA upgrade. According to Geely's plan, Xingrui will continue to provide free upgrade services for vehicle air conditioning and air purification, EPS steering assistance, panoramic image, automatic parking system and other optimization functions. In this way, new functions such as car ventilation and Bluetooth key PE will be upgraded, and the gameplay has basically been in line with new forces such as Tesla.
Coincidentally, Haval, the leader of SUV market, also equipped FOTA function on the newly launched third-generation Haval H6 in the third quarter of this year, and the third-generation Haval H6 became the world's first fuel SUV together with FOTA.
Geely Xingrui and the third generation Haval H6 can realize the FOTA function, thanks to the brand-new electronic and electrical architecture different from the past. For example, Xingrui is based on CMA architecture jointly built by Geely and Volvo, and the third generation Haval H6 is derived from the newly launched lemon platform of Great Wall.
Both of them solve the problem of fragmentation of traditional fuel vehicle control system by centralized integrated control of complex vehicle ECU control system, and both of them are equipped with Ethernet technology to solve the problem of data transmission speed between various intelligent devices. For example, the data transmission rate of FlexRay bus used in CMA architecture is 20 times that of CANbus under Volkswagen MQB platform, and Lemon platform is equipped with the industry's first Gigabit Ethernet +5G module. All these have cleared the main obstacles for fuel vehicles to realize FOTA.
Under the leadership of Geely and Haval, it is believed that more and more automobile manufacturers will soon launch FOTA fuel vehicles that can compete with new forces such as Tesla, bringing more choices and gameplay to consumers.
Whether it is a pure electric vehicle or a fuel vehicle, FOTA technology will undoubtedly become a key link in the process of automobile intelligence, allowing the increasingly homogeneous automobile industry to see new innovation opportunities.
At the same time, those vendors who underestimate new technologies or have limited software development strength will also face greater challenges. Volkswagen's embarrassing experience in the development of OTA software for ID products has made the whole industry understand that the mistakes made by Nokia in the smart phone industry 10 years ago may not necessarily be repeated in the automobile industry.
In this process, whether China, which has won the top spot in the fields of Internet and 5G technology, can really achieve "overtaking in corners" will undoubtedly become the most anticipated point for the global automobile industry in the first half of this century.
This article comes from car home, the author of the car manufacturer, and does not represent car home's position.