Definition and application of an agile development process for highly automated vehicle concepts

Author:

Torben Böddeker

Pages:

209

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.18154/RWTH-2025-08552

Keywords:

agile development, highly automated vehicle concepts

Year:

2025

Language:

german

Format:

ebook

Automation in road-based passenger transportation is progressing rapidly. Chinese OEMs offer their customers high-performance Level 2 systems in almost all luxury class derivatives. In 2021, the first Level 3 system was going into series production in Europe by Mercedes Benz AG. The American technology start-up Waymo has been bringing highly automated, commercial hailing services (Level 4) to metropolitan areas in North America since 2023. Large-scale operation of Level 4 mobility services is expected by 2030. The complete handover of the driving task to the vehicle will lead to disruptive changes in the required technical solutions and thus to completely new development challenges in the early vehicle development phase.

The detailed review of the current state of knowledge on development approaches in general and processes for the development of automated vehicles in particular shows that no published processes provide satisfactory answers to the upcoming development challenges.

Based on the need for research, it is shown that agile approaches offer great potential for the conceptual design of automated vehicles, especially at the beginning of the market launch of a completely new product category. Along the guideline VDI 2221 and using an agile approach, a holistic development process, including all required roles, is defined. The artifacts for each process step are acquired and appropriate methods and tools are proposed. The process is divided into four phases: the vision phase, the empathy phase, the synthesis phase and the iteration phase. The iteration phase itself is further subdivided into an exploration and a convergence.

For validation purposes, the process is applied within a case study. While doing so, the effectiveness of the process is evaluated. Four automated vehicles are developed on the basis of a modular and scalable structural kit. The results are virtually tested and the buildup vehicles are demonstrated under realistic conditions as part of a public driving event. The development goals are achieved at overall system level (driving event and overall design convergence) and subsystem level (structural integrity).

The case study shows that the proposed process can be used effectively for the intended development task. The user-centric orientation for exploring the open solution space and the complexity managed by self-organized development teams are particularly noteworthy. There is a need for further research into release processes and requirements management.