Factors such as ‘time-to-market’, regulations and costs are tilting the tables in the direction of modular vehicle architecture. This includes the design and assembly of all sub-systems of a vehicle in a modular manner. This also includes design standardisation and that of the production of auto parts in the form of modules.  

The advantage of modular vehicle architecture can be clearly seen at the final 'assembly' stage were numerous variants (read as trims) can be positioned seamlessly and without bringing an entire operation to the halt for the want of a module, part of an assembly tool. 

While the first instance of the employment of modular vehicle architecture in India may be hard to pin point, it was Ashok Leyland that announced the launch of a modular architecture in the form of the medium and heavy-duty AVTR truck platform as the BS VI emission norms came into effect in 2020.  

The move reminded of the comprehensive modular architecture approach of Swedish truck maker Scania. The kind of modularity Scania built into its trucks was such that its customers could choose from a wide range of aggregates such as engines, transmissions, chassis, cabin and more to build a truck that would best address their application requirements.  

Unlike the Scania’s approach to modularity, Ashok Leyland chose to offer its truck buyers the choice of engines, transmissions, suspensions, cabins and superstructure so that they could build a vehicle that met their business needs.  

One of the key reasons why Ashok Leyland chose to go down the modular architecture route was the need to cut down on components such as the exhaust parts. There would have been parts that the company would have to produce in many numbers and types to address the customer requirements in the BS VI era had it not taken to the modular approach.  

Not only did the AVTR modular architecture helped streamline the supply chain and control the costs better, it made sure the buyer of an Ashok Leyland medium or heavy-duty truck could choose from more than 600,000 unique combinations.  

Like Ashok Leyland, Tata Motors has also been quite active in design and development of modular architectures. It developed the modular truck architecture in the form of the Prima many years ago along with its Korean Daewoo commercial vehicle arm. Not limiting itself to the Prima, the company developed modular architectures in the form of the Signa and Ultra. 

It was the modular approach that led to the creation of some brilliant models such at the Signa 3118 and the Ultra 3118.  

On the passenger vehicle side, the ‘ALFA’ modular architecture is being put to good use by Tata Motors in reducing the time to market and in controlling the costs as it competes with some of the most agile global passenger vehicle manufacturers in its home market as well as other markets in the world. 
The ‘ALFA’ modular vehicle architecture is currently supporting the Altroz and Punch. It is also the basis for the electric Punch that is expected to be launched soon in India.  

Allowing a differentiated design approach and subsequently multiple body styles to meet the evolving aspirations of customers in the automotive market, the ‘ALFA modular architecture – termed as ‘Agile Light Flexible Advanced’ and basis for an exciting e 45X concept – is playing a crucial role in meeting the high-volume demand for an entire portfolio of cars at Tata Motors as of now.  

The beauty of the ‘ALFA’ architecture is such that it could be used to create diverse vehicles with distinct body styles with a variety of powertrains (petrol, diesel, CNG and even electric), transmissions, drivelines, suspensions etc, mentioned a source. A combination of body styles, hardware and software could be deployed to offer the necessary attributes, he added.  

Pointing at the recent introduction of Punch CNG with twin-cylinder CNG technology, he informed that the ‘ALFA’ modular architecture is helping to expand the scope of twin-cylinder CNC tech as much.  

The differentiating factor of the technology is that it does not eat into the vehicle storage space. The vehicle body can receive necessary reinforcements to bear the additional weight of the cylinders. In the CNG Punch, the suspension too has been suitably strengthened to handle the additional weight.  

Observing that the CNG Punch is just one part, the source said that the electric Punch would mean that the ‘ALFA’ modular vehicle architecture has truly come to age. Claimed to be undergoing advanced testing and validation, the electric Punch would further enhance Tata Motors’ lead in the electric passenger vehicle space. It is expected to be introduced by the end of this year or early next year.  

The ambitions that Tata Motors has regarding its EV portfolio could be derived from the fact that on 29 August 2023 it announced a new brand identity TATA.ev for its EV business. It is aligned with Tata Motors' commitment towards sustainability and innovation.

EVs influence modular vehicle architectures
EVs are turning to be a big factor for the creation of modular platforms lately as they promise less complexities pertaining to platform engineering, keeping them to the bare minimum. Modular electric vehicle architectures are also enabling the development of core platforms with standardised design and production of auto parts in the form of modules and a streamlined as well as compact final 'assembly' as per the positioning of models. 

The R&D and production costs, shortening the development cycle of new models, facilitating the unification of quality standards and improving the overall strength of products, modular electric vehicle architectures are enabling unique ‘oil-to-electricity’ transformations as well.  

Dedicated modular electric vehicle architectures are enabling clever integration (read as badge engineering) across brands and as a part of the new cooperation strategies. With software defined vehicles the order of the day, electric vehicles especially, the tilt towards modular vehicle architecture is proving to be beneficial in terms of offering a differentiated user experience, to keep control over the supply chain and to keep control over the costs and to test and validate. 

(Image for representation purpose only)

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Pre-owned car marketplace Cars24 has announced the launch of AI Labs, a dedicated initiative designed to develop artificial intelligence-native products and support early-stage entrepreneurs.

As part of the program, the company has committed a USD 20 million investment fund targeted at startups and development teams building transformative AI technologies.

The move marks an expansion of Cars24’s internal technology strategy, where machine learning and artificial intelligence models have already been integrated into core business operations to manage decision-making workflows and customer experience interfaces. Through AI Labs, the company will extend its technical resources externally to independent software engineers and startup founders.

To establish the infrastructure for the program, Cars24 has partnered with technology providers including OpenAI, Amazon Web Services (AWS) and ElevenLabs. This ecosystem will provide participating developers with cloud infrastructure, technical expertise, distribution networks and advanced language and voice synthesis models to accelerate product deployment.

The operational focus of AI Labs is divided into three primary activities:

• Build: Developing proprietary AI-native applications and contributing to global open-source software innovation.
• Partner: Collaborating with established artificial intelligence firms to encourage industry experimentation and technology adoption.
• Invest: Supplying seed capital and strategic support to early-stage businesses building software categories.

Beyond direct equity investments, the initiative will fund community engagement programs, including regional hackathons, builder incubation programs and collaborative open-source projects designed to stimulate developer experimentation.

Vikram Chopra, Founder and CEO, Cars24, said, “Every major technology shift creates a handful of companies that go on to define the future. We believe AI is the biggest shift of our generation, and the opportunity ahead is far larger than anything we've seen before. Over the last few years, we've seen AI fundamentally change how we operate, build products, and serve customers AI Labs is our way of giving back to the ecosystem that is shaping this future. We want to back founders early, help them move faster and support the people building things that seem impossible today but inevitable tomorrow.”

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Automotive supplier Valeo and Electronic Design Automation software provider Zuken have announced a strategic partnership to develop an open, artificial intelligence-assisted electronic design platform. The collaboration will operate under a joint program named the ‘Zuken Valeo InnoLab’.

The initiative integrates Zuken's AI architecture with Valeo’s custom AI agents and industrial data to create a real-time collaborative ecosystem between software tools and engineers. The primary objective of the program is to reduce hardware design timelines while maintaining structural robustness across complex automotive electronic systems.

The technical development framework spans the entire electronic design flow and is organised into four main operational areas:

• Functional Generative Design: Valeo will deploy its generative AI models within Zuken’s System Planner software to instantly generate and evaluate multi-criteria system architectures based on predefined corporate standards.
• Digital Continuity: Zuken’s open architecture will interface with Valeo’s existing digital ecosystem to provide end-to-end data traceability. This integration is designed to comply with the Automotive SPICE 4.0 (ASPICE4.0) Hardware Engineering process group standard, allowing Valeo's AI to process data and execute automated actions directly within the platform.
• Assisted Detailed Design: Valeo will integrate virtual AI copilot agents to assist engineering teams in real time with hardware rule verification, solution searching, and constraint implementations. Concurrently, Zuken is developing native AI functions to accelerate schematic entries by drawing from Valeo’s standardised components database.
• Automated Placement and Routing: Physical circuit integration will utilise Zuken’s Design Force engine, which features automated placement and routing algorithms. Valeo will use Zuken's software development kit to train the AI engine against specific automotive environmental and physical constraints to achieve correct initial executions.

Christophe Le Ligne, Vice-President – Research and Development, Valeo, said, “For Valeo, Zuken is much more than a software provider; it is a true innovation partner. The power of Zuken’s AI roadmap, combined with the exceptional openness of its architecture, allows us to hybridise our own artificial intelligence tools with their engine. This win-win partnership is the best way to tackle the challenge of automotive complexity by slashing our design times while guaranteeing 100% robustness.”

Ryosuke Takagi, Executive Officer and General Manager – R&D Division, Zuken, added, “Our vision at Zuken has always been to provide intelligent tools that adapt to our customers’ most complex challenges. Collaborating with a technological leader like Valeo pushes our ‘Autonomous Brain’ roadmap to its highest level of performance. By opening our System Planner, Design Gateway, and Design Force solutions to Valeo’s AI agents, we demonstrate that the true power of AI in engineering lies in the alliance between a high-performance software engine and expert industrial know-how.”

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Artificial intelligence software developer Helm.ai has launched two foundation models, GenSim-3 and VidGen-3, establishing a native Full HD (1920x1080) resolution standard for generative simulation across a 6-camera, 360-degree surround-view suite.

The architecture delivers 5x the pixel density of industry benchmarks to assist automotive developers facing the limitation where physical collection of edge cases becomes logistically restrictive.

Traditional generative world models typically cap resolution at roughly 0.4 megapixels per camera. Helm.ai’s platform outputs a native 2 megapixels per camera, yielding a synchronised 12-megapixel synthetic canvas per timestep. This specification matches the hardware parameters of production-grade vehicle cameras to reduce the domain gap for SAE Level 2 through Level 4 autonomous vehicle development.

The platform functions as a virtual sensor twin by mathematically replicating physical constraints and hardware anomalies, including lens flares, sensor banding patterns, and exposure blinding. To accommodate different neural network training routines, the pipeline can be configured to a high-speed validation mode using a three-camera setup at 30 frames per second, or a spatial context mode generating a six-camera surround view at 5 frames per second.

Data generation is split into two operational pipelines. GenSim-3 focuses on data augmentation by modifying environmental parameters such as weather, lighting, and object surfaces across real-world video segments at native 2MP resolution. VidGen-3 focuses on data creation, synthesising driving sequences from scratch by simulating environments, agent behaviours, and traffic logic without baseline video to patch geographic data gaps.

Helm.ai achieved the 2MP standard using a cluster of a few hundred GPUs rather than the thousands typically required for sub-HD video generation. This framework reduces the GPU infrastructure footprint for vehicle manufacturers and provides a method for compressing autonomous driving software onto mass-market on-vehicle compute chips.

Vladislav Voroninski, CEO and Founder, Helm.ai, said, "We are moving the industry from standard 'AI video' to authentic, hardware-accurate sensor emulation. By leading with a Full HD (2MP) standard and a 12-megapixel total aggregate capability per timestep, we have solved the resolution bottleneck that has historically limited the utility of generative AI in safety-critical systems. By optimising our compute architecture, we are giving our partners a high-performance platform to validate their autonomous stacks using synthetic data that perfectly matches the fidelity of their actual production sensors."

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Global automotive technology supplier Marelli has marked the 30th anniversary of its flagship electronics manufacturing plant in Guangzhou. Established in 1996 as Marelli’s inaugural manufacturing investment in China, the facility has transformed from a baseline assembly outpost into a major smart manufacturing and hardware-software validation centre.

Over the past three decades, the facility has expanded from a single operational production line with approximately 100 technicians into a 30,000-square-meter automotive electronics campus.

Today, the facility employs nearly 1,000 people and runs 66 active production lines, manufacturing components for both localised Chinese vehicle programs and global vehicle architectures.

The campus houses an adjacent, fully integrated Engineering Center that holds more than 100 registered patents. The manufacturing framework integrates high-precision assembly lines, automated optical bonding modules and site-wide rooftop solar arrays designed to manage factory energy overheads and lower operational carbon density.

The Guangzhou plant functions as a strategic industrialisation hub focused on low-cost, scalable architectures suited for the industry transition toward connected, software-defined vehicles (SDVs). The facility specialises in several high-growth hardware and display segments like advanced display solutions based on Mini-LED and MicroLED technologies. Additional key platforms include electronic control units (ECUs) for body and seat systems, zone control units, as well as digital cockpits, digital instrument clusters, and 5G telematics systems.

Ravi Tallapragada, President of Marelli’s Electronics business unit, said, “Our Guangzhou plant is a cornerstone of Marelli’s Electronics business in China and a powerful example of how innovation and advanced manufacturing can drive sustainable growth. Over the past 30 years, the team has continuously evolved its capabilities, developing advanced technologies and scalable platforms that address the rapid transformation of the automotive industry, building on long-standing collaboration with customers and partners. I’m proud of our team in Guangzhou and confident that the plant will continue to play a key role in shaping Marelli’s future globally.”

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