AUTOSAR is an Automotive Software Architecture open standards organization created to provide an open standard for automotive architecture for developing vehicular software, user interfaces and management. Core members include the PSA Peugeot Citroën, Toyota MotorVolkswagen, BMW Group, DaimlerChrysler, Ford Motor Company, General Motors, and automotive suppliers Bosch, Continental and Siemens VDO. There are a total of 35 corporate members as of September 2005.
The professed goals are modularity, scalability, transferability and re-usability of functions to provide a standardized platform for automotive systems. This will enable system wide configuration and optimization to meet runtime requirements of automotive devices. AUTOSAR plans to complete standards for software interfaces by August, 2006. Many of the low-level components of AUTOSAR (the real time operating system and communications layer) are derived from OSEK
The sole motive of an AUTOSAR is the replacement of the proprietary standards of the software system functions, into an open standard. This helps in building a plug-and-play atmosphere where the software modules can go hand in hand with the electronic architecture at the same time. This creates an open standard for automotive E/E architecture. This in turn will help in having a standardized tool chain that can become the fundamental building block for management functions for both the future applications and standard software modules.
