From Ericsson to Automotive Giants

It all began with Ericsson, whose Lund-based mobile platform division was later acquired by Intel. When Intel closed its Lund office in 2016, a group of skilled engineers faced uncertainty. Instead of starting a consultancy, they approached Volvo Cars, which lead to the creation of a new R&D unit in Lund. Today, Volvo employs nearly 400 people in the city, focusing on software for electric and autonomous vehicles.

“We knew our expertise was in demand, and we weren’t particularly eager to start a consulting firm. So we took a meeting with Volvo and explained what we could do. It was quite unique because there was no company, no product – just 40 people with broad expertise,”

says Henrik Svensson, Site Manager at Volvo Cars in Lund, to Rapidus

A Magnet for Global Players

Lund’s talent pool and research ecosystem have drawn major players since then. Bosch now has almost 200 employees in Lund, developing autonomous driving and connected infotainment systems. Nvidia and Continental Automotive established offices at Ideon Science Park, focusing on car tech innovation. Rivian and Volkswagen Group Technologies (RVT) recently acquired Iternio, a Lund-based startup behind the route-planning tool A Better Route Planner, with plans to expand their team to 50+ in the next year.

“We’re not only expanding our existing trip-planning functions but also adding new areas of work. Today, we’re about 20 people in Lund, and in a year, we aim to be at least 50,”

says Bo Lincoln, who leads RVT’s Lund initiative, to Rapidus

A thriving ecosystem of startups and established companies is taking shape in the region, with a center in Lund. Startups and companies like Zenseact (Volvo’s self-driving software unit), Acconeer, Remotive Labs, Setrab, Terranet and Koenigsegg pushing boundaries in autonomous driving, electrification, and smart mobility.

The region has a world-class research, especially with Lund University. There is a strong tradition of collaboration between academia and industry.

“|A]ll the key ingredients for software-defined vehicles: proximity to groundbreaking research and a highly educated workforce; a strong tradition of entrepreneurship and collaboration between academia and industry; proximity to other high-tech companies, which creates synergies and attracts investment; and a high quality of life that makes it easy to attract and retain talent,”

says Florian Marcard, who leads Bosch R&D Lund in the article

Photo by News Oresund, CC-BY license

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The combination of technologies offers a new method for infotainment quality testing. This approach is designed to provide OEMs (Original Equipment Manufacturers) and Tier 1 suppliers with enhanced tools for early testing of infotainment systems, using only hardware test rigs before full fleet trials are feasible.

The joint solution was initially presented at the COVESA All Members Meeting in Gothenburg in April 2024, featuring early adoption by P3 for their SPARQ OS platform, which is based on Android Automotive OS.

“This integration demonstrates how OEMs can ensure their In-Vehicle Infotainment systems are developed with high-quality technology, enabling faster and more confident product launches.”

says Marius Mailat, CTO & Managing Director of P3 digital services

The collaboration aims to address challenges in replicating the intricate interactions between user behavior and vehicle mechanics, which have historically hindered the development process. By merging Profilence’s analytical capabilities with RemotiveLabs’ vehicle data integration, the partnership offers a more comprehensive method for analyzing infotainment system performance.

“Our joint solution simplifies the use of real vehicle data in system testing, which supports automated, end-to-end testing processes that are scalable.”

says Aleksandar Filipov, CTO of RemotiveLabs

This partnership not only aims to streamline the testing of infotainment systems but also seeks to enable manufacturers to conduct comprehensive quality assessments earlier in the development cycle. Such advancements could significantly impact the automotive industry’s ability to deliver high-quality, reliable infotainment systems.

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RemotiveLabs “for developers; by developers” tooling is designed to simplify how software is prototyped, built and tested in automotive. The platform core, the RemotiveBroker, facilitates hardware abstraction and provides a flexible vehicle development environment.

“RemotiveCloud in essence is a virtualized extension of the RemotiveBroker environment. It enables teams to gain control over their development environment and work collaboratively with third parties to significantly speed up development”.

explains founder and CTO Aleksandar Filipov.

RemotiveLabs has onboarded its first couple of OEMs and have central Proof of Concepts running at additional automotive brands. Further, the company has initiated collaborations and partnerships with several international tech companies which further demonstrates traction of the growing platform.

“Teams from different backgrounds can more efficiently contribute to car development with the RemotiveLabs platform. The new abstractions it creates can lessen dependence on limited-availability vehicle hardware, and enables access to data from issue reports that can be invaluable to engineers. This simplifies both prototyping and debugging stages for modern vehicles utilizing Android Automotive Operating System.”

says Scott Goodson, Director for AAOS Platform at Google. 

The company’s long-term ambition is to provide a complete vehicle virtualization environment.

“To be able to start early with software development, without all the hardware hassles, to validate architecture and do early integration testing supports the overall software transformation in automotive. Our tooling is designed to help our customers build a larger portion of their software in the cloud, and then let them move over to hardware step by step. Basically, thinking that the car is the physical twin, and not the other way around”.

comments Per Sigurdson, co-founder and CEO.

The ability to get more development done in a virtual prototyping environment means more speed, more collaboration and faster iteration, reducing the total development effort significantly.

RemotiveLabs was founded in 2020. The platform is specialized for iterative vehicle software development. Last year the company finalised their first external investment round with Volvo Cars Tech Fund and others as investors.

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