Signal-Oriented ECUs in a Centralized Service-Oriented Architecture: Scalability of the Layered Software Architecture

The industry is quickly moving away from a function/signal-oriented architecture towards Service-Oriented Architectures (SOA). To carry-over legacy signal-oriented ECUs during the transition phase, Volvo Cars has developed a layered software (SW) architecture based on the concepts of "device proxys" (i.e., one per legacy ECU), signal real-time database and service interface. This architecture, executing on the central computer on the TSN backbone, provides a clear separation of concerns between its components with a reduced additional complexity.
In this presentation, we will review the main challenges faced in the integration of signal-oriented ECUs into SOA, and present the solutions explored at Volvo with a focus on layered SW architecture in the centralized E/E architecture and its 3 core components:
o Device Proxies
o Signal DataBase
o Service Interface
We then report on the performances of this architecture in terms of latencies and conclude on the maximum number of signal-oriented frames and legacy ECUs that can be handled. The performance evaluation is conducted by simulation, with sensitivity analysis to identify the performance bottlenecks. The E/E architecture under study is a prototype TSN-based central computing architecture targeted at next-generation models.
The main questions that will be discussed throughout the presentation are 1) how to efficiently handle signal to service conversion? 2) The performance and the scalability of the SW architecture proposed and 3) the suitability of SOME/IP as the SOA protocol.