Vehicle SOA Breakthrough Technology - Refocus on Regional Controller

Recently, Landmark, a well-known domestic in-vehicle software solution provider, and RT-Thread Technology (hereinafter referred to as RT-Thread), a new in-vehicle operating system manufacturer, jointly launched the Gemini-OS software platform for zonal controllers (Zonal ECUs) to help the mass production of vehicle SOA functions.

In the wave of software-defined vehicles, as the electronic and electrical architecture of the whole vehicle evolves from distributed to centralized, the regional controller, as an ECU that connects a large number of sensors/actuators with the on-board central computer, plays an important role in the design of the service-oriented architecture (SOA) of the whole vehicle. It is necessary to support both traditional buses such as CAN/LIN and automotive Ethernet. Under this positioning, due to performance, cost and other considerations, the current mainstream regional controllers are usually developed based on high-performance MCUs and classic AUTOSAR (AUTOSAR Classic Platform, hereinafter referred to as ASR-CP) to meet basic needs.

As the mainstream basic software solution on traditional ECU, ASR-CP, based on signal communication and model-based development, can well support the development of traditional body electronic applications based on CAN/LIN and other buses. On the other side of the regional controller, the development of Ethernet-based SOA services between the regional controller and the on-board central computer urgently needs a more efficient, convenient and flexible solution.

尽管当前用于区域控制器的主流车规MCU所能提供的硬件资源（相对MPU）依旧受限，但已显著强于在其它诸如智能物联网、工业控制领域常用的MCU。这些行业中已普遍存在基于实时操作系统（RTOS）开发以太网应用的成功案例，覆盖了从消费电子到任务关键系统的方方面面。车载高性能MCU均具有多个（~6）CPU核心，为在单块芯片上部署第二个OS提供了必要条件。RT-Thread Secure AUTO作为符合POSIX规范的小型嵌入式RTOS，除了具备性能高、资源占用少等特点外，其高效的网络协议栈与丰富的软件生态非常适合作为ASR-CP的辅助，接管区域控制器中以太网相关的功能。

Gemini-OS divides the CPU resources of the MCU into the primary partition and the secondary partition, running two OS instances, ASR-CP and RT-Thread Secure AUTO, respectively. ASR-CP is suitable for running traditional body electronic functions and supports a higher level of functional safety; RT-Thread Secure AUTO is responsible for running the newly added SOA business. Customers can flexibly determine the number of CPU cores in each partition based on the actual situation of their own applications. In response to the new demand for mutual communication between the two OSes, the platform provides an efficient and secure IPC (Inter-Processor Communication) mechanism to exchange data in a shared memory manner. Landmark has developed a dedicated CDD (Complex Device Driver) as an IPC plug-in on the ASR-CP side to facilitate the import of configuration tools for modeling and integration. On the RT-Thread Secure AUTO side, Landmark fully utilized the rich software package resources of the RT-Thread open source community to tailor SOA middleware and related services for an OEM customer, helping the customer solve the deployment problem of the SOA framework in the next-generation centralized electronic and electrical architecture. In the next step, both parties will increase investment based on their respective advantages, while continuing to upgrade the functions of the existing Gemini-OS and adapting to more types of chip platforms to meet the customized needs of different customers for the SOA framework!

About Landmark & ​​RT-Thread

Lanma Cabin Intelligent Technology (Shanghai) Co., Ltd. is a company dedicated to the research and development of intelligent cockpit domain control software and new vehicle architecture, and provides software solutions and tool chains based on multi-core heterogeneous SoC and MCU. Founded in 2019, the company focuses on the research and development of the 8155 chip platform, helping many OEMs to successfully mass-produce the 8155 cockpit platform. Since 2021, the company has expanded its vehicle computing, assisted driving and architecture design business. Currently, Lanma is participating in the pre-research and mass production projects of many OEMs, including the design of the next-generation electronic and electrical architecture, regional controller development, central computing unit development, SOA service framework implementation, etc.

Shanghai Ruiside Electronic Technology Co., Ltd. enjoys a high reputation in the field of domestic operating systems. The RT-Thread open source embedded operating system it contributes and maintains has become one of the embedded operating systems with the largest installed base (over 1.4 billion units), the largest number of developers, and the best software and hardware ecology on the market. It is widely used in many industries such as security, industrial vehicles, wearables, and smart cities. The company has a series of independent intellectual property technologies, including high-reliability RTOS, log-type high-reliability file systems, low-power technology, GUI graphics libraries, and intelligent audio. It is the company's long-term mission and pursuit to build RT-Thread into the most mainstream platform for industries such as automotive, large-scale industry, and artificial intelligence, and to build a new service and operation model!