To a hammer everything looks like a nail, to an IT professional like James Kuffner everything looks like a computer. At Google, the US expert on artificial intelligence began to turn cars into rolling computers. Now he wants to complete his mission at the world’s largest carmaker Toyota as Chief Digital Officer. Many engineers are skeptical about the metamorphosis of the automobile, says Kuffner in an interview with the Handelsblatt. “But I think it’s inevitable.”
Toyota’s board member is not only concerned with what every car manufacturer is trying to do anyway: to add digital software platforms to the still analogue means of transport, which take over the control of increasingly self-driving cars. Kuffner also wants to enable simple hardware upgrades, such as new sensors, so that the car can keep up with ever faster technological developments over its lifetime.
Toyota already put a first glimpse of the idea of the car, which can also be updated with hardware, on the road at the end of 2021: In the premium model Lexus LS, the expensive lidar sensors, which scan the environment while driving, can be replaced via plug-and-play. This gives Toyota the opportunity to improve the ability for autonomous driving at any time.
For Kuffner, this is just the beginning. The introduction of standardized interfaces will bring “incredible flexibility” with it, says the expert, who is also head of Toyota’s Tokyo software and technology center Woven Planet. The requirements are far higher than for computers. But the car software is developed far enough to absorb hardware upgrades.
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Of course, hardware upgrades for motor vehicles have been possible for a long time. So far it has been called tuning. In mostly laborious manual work, modifications are made to give engines a few more horsepower, new suspensions are used and spoilers are attached. But with the possibility of further developing cars like a smartphone by downloading new software, the car of the future needs far more development leeway than before.
The US expert is driving forward the digitization of Toyota.
(Photo: Getty Images; Per-Anders Pettersson)
One possibility is, as with smartphones or watches, to build in a little more computing capacity from the start, which can then be used over a few years. The problem: If the reserves are exhausted, customers are left with either a technical standstill or the purchase of the new generation of devices.
With product cycles of around seven years at the moment, this long waiting time is likely to be a nuisance for the digitally influenced generations. The high price of cars makes the idea of a quick new purchase completely unattractive, both financially and ecologically. Worse still, important functions such as autonomous driving will not only be further developed through improved algorithms, but also through improved sensors.
Cultural Revolution from above
That leaves the second option: from the outset, companies design cars with standardized interfaces in such a way that important hardware can also be replaced quickly and inexpensively. To stay with the comparison with a computer, in this case the car becomes a kind of PC case, the technical inner workings of which can be partially renewed.
The trick, especially at the beginning of development, will be to define the most important sensors and interfaces that will permanently improve the future viability of your own product. At Toyota, Kuffner’s Woven Planet is helping: The company was founded to introduce basic research in the field of artificial intelligence and robotics from the Californian Toyota Research Institute into car development.
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The company is responsible for several of the group’s key projects, ranging from the artificial intelligence-supported Arene development platform, a high-precision road map system that updates cars in real time through its sensors and driving data, to Toyota’s smart city Woven City .
Whether Kuffner can realize his idea with the proud car manufacturer is still open. After all, CEO Akio Toyoda has his back in trying to teach the Japanese organization the technology and culture of Silicon Valley – out of conviction. The grandson of the group’s founder sought out proximity to IT groups and software companies early on in his career.
Among other things, he wants to make cars more interactive and sensitive when it comes to communicating with the owners. And he ensures that this way of thinking will continue to define the Group in the future. Toyoda’s son Daisuke gains engineering and leadership experience as senior vice president of Woven Planet – under Kuffner.
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