Mexican Media Brands
BMW Aims to Build In-House Expertise for an Autonomous Future
BMW AG envisions a time where half its researchers are software engineers and most of its customers ride around in self-driving cars.
Share
BMW AG envisions a time where half its researchers are software engineers and most of its customers ride around in self-driving cars.
Klaus Froehlich, BMW’s board member in charge of r&d, tells Reuters the company’s mission is to offer the market’s “most intelligent car.” Doing so, he says, will mean building in-house software capacity to avoid becoming nothing more than a “metal bodies” supplier to such companies as Apple or Google.
Froehlich tells Reuters his objective is to leverage the ratio of software engineers BMW currently uses from among the 30,000 employees, contractors and supplier engineering staffs from 20% today to 50% in five years.
Achieving that ambitious goal will mean finding the manpower equivalent of 15,000-20,000 engineers—more than BMW could hope to assemble itself in such a short time, Froehlich says.
Froehlich believes the key will be to quickly create a network of new suppliers, including many from outside the traditional auto industry. He tells Reuters one urgent need at BMW is to build up its expertise in cloud computing.
RELATED CONTENT
-
GM Is Down with Diesels
General Motors is one company that is clearly embracing the diesel engine.
-
Jeeps Modified for Moab
On Easter morning in Moab, Utah, when the population of that exceedingly-hard-to-get-to town in one of the most beautiful settings on Earth has more than doubled, some people won’t be hunting for Easter eggs, but will be trying to get a good look at one of the vehicles six that Jeep has prepared for real-life, fast-feedback from the assembled at the annual Easter Jeep Safari.
-
On Automotive: An All Electric Edition
A look at electric vehicle-related developments, from new products to recycling old batteries.
