E

&

S S

W H I T E P A P E R

MANAGING ELECTRICAL COMPLEXITY

WITH A PLATFORM LEVEL APPROACH
AND SYSTEMS ENGINEERING

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Managing Electrical Complexity with a Platform Level Approach and Systems Engineering

ABSTRACT
Customers and legislative requirements are increasing the demand for functionality provided by vehicle
electrical/electronic (E/E) systems. This demand presents new challenges for OEMssuch as the high
cost of electrical system development and manufacturing; the increase in weight; unreliability or
breakdowns as a result of electrical malfunction; and the huge complexity of platform electrical systems
brought on by configuration variability, as well as legislative requirements.
In this context, the electrical system platform plays a unique role. It integrates all the individual E/E
systems. When they are connected, even though the individual systems work separately as intended,
unanticipated properties emerge that cause problems. These resulting errors and problems often
emerge late in the design and build process, causing delays in the production schedule and costly
rework.
Electrical design engineers are inundated with changes made to the many subsystems of the platform
throughout the development and manufacturing process. And its an ongoing problematic issue to
manage and track these changes from various engineering disciplines and business domains.
In this competitive and challenging environment, thought-leaders are recommending a shift to systems
engineering. Using a systems engineering approach could help OEMs maintain product quality, reduce
costs, manage change, and achieve time to market. The Mentor Graphics Capital tool suite for electrical
design and manufacturing fits well into the systems engineering methodology.
This paper talks about applying systems engineering principles using the Capital tool suite to address
these issues.

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Managing Electrical Complexity with a Platform Level Approach and Systems Engineering

ELECTRICAL SYSTEMS COMPLEXITY INCREASES THE CHALLENGES FOR OEMS

The demand for electrical/electronic (E/E) systems functionality in automotive and mil/aero vehicles is on
the rise from customers and legislative requirements. This presents particular challenges for OEMs,
including:
the high cost of electrical systems development and
manufacturing;
increasing bulk and weight;
electrical malfunction resulting in unreliability or
breakdowns; and
configuration variability offered to customers, as well
as legislative requirements, that greatly increases the
complexity of platform electrical systems.

ELECTRONICS IS KEY TO COMPETITION

With the growth of on-board electronics in
the automobile sector, from two-wheelers to
tractors and heavy commercial vehicles,
semiconductor industry experts believe that
in the immediate future, electronics will be
the differentiator.
Vehicle differentiation will be largely about
electronics and so will the problems.

From Role of Electronics in Contemporary

In this context, the electrical distribution system platform
Automobiles, The Economic Times
plays a unique role. It interconnects all the individual E/E
systems to enable this functionality. Although the individual
systems work separately as intended, when they are
connected, unanticipated properties emerge that can cause problems. These resulting errors and
problems often appear late in the design and build process, resulting in delays in the production
schedule and costly rework.

Electrical design engineers are inundated with changes made to the many subsystems of the platform
throughout the development and manufacturing process. Managing and keeping track of these changes
from various engineering disciplines and business domains is an ongoing problematic issue.
The following discusses some of these issues facing vehicle OEMs today.

Business as usual isnt

as usual any longer.
We cant expect to do
things the same way
today that we did 10 or
12, or even 7 or 8, years
ago. The landscape
has changed. We have
to change with it.
DAN BOILEAU, CHIEF ENGINEER
AT ALCOA

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MORE ELECTRICAL SYSTEMS ADDS TO WEIGHT

AND COST
Cable routing and electrical functions added to a vehicle significantly impacts the
overall weight and cost of production. For example, researchers at G.H. Raisoni
College of Engineering report an increasing demand for high-end luxury cars,
which contain more than three miles and nearly 200 pounds of wiring. The added
electrical systems wiring forces electrical platform designers to make the best
cost/weight/function trade-offs.
MORE ELECTRONIC FUNCTIONALITY LAYERS ON
THE COMPLEXITY
The complexity of design and manufacturing is increased as E/E functionality
increases. Todays modern vehicles have a large number of electronic modules
inside that realize a huge number of functions, and these functions may be
distributed among several electric control units (ECUs). Premium cars can have as
many as 70 ECUs that are connected to 5 system busses, realizing more than 800
functions. This complexity can cause unanticipated problems such as sneak circuits

Managing Electrical Complexity with a Platform Level Approach and Systems Engineering

where particular combinations

of switches and loads can
cause the inadvertent
operation, or disablement, of
an electrical function. This can
have a range of outcomes,
from bewilderment of the
driver to more serious
outcomes such as loss of a
safety-critical function.

Example of design and development

costs for automotive E/E (Source:
European OEM, 2013, design review
milestone)

OVERWHELMING CONFIGURATION VARIABILITY

The car is the most sophisticated consumer electronics available today. Configurations in electrical
systems are exploding with the many features offered to customers to raise value and the need to meet
safety, reliability, and emissions legislative requirements such as ISO 26262 and the Euro 5/6 emission
standards.
Every step along the electrical design process is multiplied with each configuration. Engineers are
presented with a set of requirements associated with the overall platform that they decompose through
several stages; first, into individual features and, then, the functions that implement the features. Those
functions are clustered into systems and allocated to physical devices or software. The embedded
software in todays modern automobile can be as much as 100 million lines of code. Then logical designs
are associated with a mechanical definition of the overall vehicle and interconnected with a physical
wiring system, which is
ultimately partitioned into
harnesses. Each individual
platform configuration has its
own unique harness, which
can translate into thousands,
even millions, of harnesses.

Example of tooling costs for

automotive E/E (Source: European
OEM, 2013, design review milestone)

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Managing Electrical Complexity with a Platform Level Approach and Systems Engineering

This configuration explosion

affects the entire data flow
from requirements to service
documentation. Once sold,
OEMs are responsible for
enabling efficient vehicle
servicing across its life. Laws
are increasingly demanding
that this data, specific to each
unique vehicle configuration,
be available to all dealers (not
just the OEM network).

Example of component costs for

automotive E/E (Source: European
OEM, 2013, design review milestone)

MANAGING DESIGN CHANGES

Historically, each stage of vehicle design has been an island with its own design tools and a complex
local dialect that describes the components, inputs, and outputs of the particular stage. Communication
has often been cumbersome, requiring conversions and/or manual data re-entry as the input to each
step, resulting in redundancy and delays. These methods simply cannot meet todays time, cost, and
competitive pressures. Electrical design engineers need to be able to share information with each other
and with other islands to improve cross-team and cross-discipline communication. They need to be
able to more easily understand the context and effects of changes so that they can be implemented
faster and with fewer misunderstandings.
SLOW AND STEADY WILL NO LONGER WIN THE RACE
Todays cycle time is too slow to compete effectively and meet demand. The process of creating a
detailed wiring design from the higher-level system design is repetitive and time-consuming, adding
months to the design cycle. The issues discussed here are increasing design and manufacturing cycle
time while competition is increasing the pressure to build the ideal electrical system faster.

SYSTEMS ENGINEERING MANAGES COMPLEXITY BETTER

This increasing electrical content coupled with legislation and supply chain challenges are giving
impetus to process change. Systems engineering can offer relief to those overwhelmed by modern
vehicle development. Substantial evidence shows the effectiveness of the systems engineering paradigm
in managing complexity, with several key characteristics: holism, abstraction, progressive integration,
and interconnection.
Holism means that a problem is viewed in its entirety rather than as a set of isolated activities. In the
vehicle E/E context, this means linking engineering domains as diverse as embedded software design,
electronic component design, electrical distribution system design, and mechanical design.

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Managing Electrical Complexity with a Platform Level Approach and Systems Engineering

The Mentor Graphics definition of holistic, means managing the interconnection of different
disciplines and the entire vehicle electrical platform.
Systems engineering characteristics include:
Consideration of whole problem (multidisciplinary)
Navigation through multiple abstractions, ideally via machine-readable executable specifications
Importance of requirements
Concrete verification procedures
Emergent behavior from integration of sub-elements.

APPLY THE SYSTEMS ENGINEERING V MODEL TO ELECTRICAL DESIGN

Typically, disciplines have their own work cycle that represents the project life cycle development from
their own view. This has made dealing efficiently with configuration variability, requirements, electrical
systems complexity, and design changes challenging.
The typical V model for each
area of development,
disconnected from the other
disciplines. Unfortunately, this
old way can be inefficient and
error-prone, costing in waste
and profit, and too slow to be
competitive.

A solution to this challenge is to implement a systems engineering methodology with advanced

software that provides digital continuity, requirements tracking, documentation, and design automation,
and to apply the systems V model in a multidisciplinary approach that covers each stage of the life cycle.
The left side of the V represents the decomposition of requirements and creation of system
specifications. The right side of the V represents integration of parts and their validation.

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Managing Electrical Complexity with a Platform Level Approach and Systems Engineering

In the systems engineering V model:

Data flows freely within and across disciplines

providing digital continuity
Design automation minimizes need for validation
Decisions are implemented and their efficacy assessed
initially and as they change across the entire product
lifecyle
Integration technologies such as Open Services for
Lifecycle Collaboration (OSLC) are embraced
Design cycles are shortened and marketshare increases

Using this approach, data at a high level of abstraction is

progressively decomposed and enriched to lower
abstractions until buildable components (software blocks,
electronic components, and wire harnesses, etc.) become
fully defined. These components are then progressively
integrated, with repeated verification steps until the
complete system is assembled. Transitions between
abstractions can be automated through machine
executable specifications (a process known as synthesis),
while full traceability is maintained, from requirement to
component implementation.

DIGITAL CONTINUITY AND DESIGN AUTOMATION ARE CRUCIAL TO SUCCESS

The Mentor Graphics Capital tool suite enables this approach and fits well into the systems engineering
paradigm. It can be integrated easily with each manufacturers design and build systems, tools, and
processes. It delivers a whole systems view of the electrical design process, providing platform-level
abstraction that:
enables engineering choice, simulation, checking, and other tasks to be undertaken in the context
of the overall vehicle;
provides an integrated management environment that seamlessly matures data through multiple
abstractions, facilitates design change management, and supports design asset reuse;
uses configurable, rules-driven synthesis functionality that automatically transforms and enriches
data as it progresses from one abstraction to another;
features decision support and design verification capabilities; and
includes support for all common approaches to electrical system configuration management,
including composite supersets, feature-based configuration, and sequence-based effectivity.
PLATFORM-LEVEL ABSTRACTION
The Capital tool suite uses a generative approach in which wiring designs are automatically generated
from higher level inputs, allowing correct by construction design creation. The software can
automatically generate accurate wiring designs for all allowable configurations at the platform level.
This approach enables manufacturers to capture and develop their competitive intellectual property.
System integration is rapid, accomplishing in a few hours a task that would otherwise take weeks. This
reduces electrical design times and costs while enabling the evaluation of alternative architectures.
INTEGRATING THE DESIGN ENVIRONMENT
The Capital tool suite is a complete electrical design package that fits into the larger ecosystem and is
designed from the outset with an IT architecture that facilitates integration with third-party MCAD, PLM,
or ALM tools.
FACILITATING DESIGN CHANGE MANAGEMENT
The Capital tools allow multiple levels of abstraction and manage links between them so that changes
can be propagated throughout the various levels. Changes are propagated in a controlled and intelligent
fashion, ensuring that any value-add work previously done at lower levels of abstraction is retained.
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Managing Electrical Complexity with a Platform Level Approach and Systems Engineering

By interfacing the Capital tool suite with enterpriselevel change management tools, such as IBM Rational
Team Concert, changes applicable to the electrical
distribution system can be coordinated with those
required in other disciplines to fully implement the
change. With this method, the Capital tool suite keeps
value-added work while incorporating changes
efficiently, saving time and supporting concurrent
design.
OPTIMIZING ELECTRICAL ARCHITECTURES

L-3 LINK CUTS CHANGE ORDERS BY 90%

L-3 Link in the United Kingdom designs and
builds flight simulators, supplying multiple
customers worldwide. The high level of
complexity of modern simulators severely
strains design processes and the software
used to support them.
The Capital technology provided the detailed
component modeling functionality, extensive
checking automation, and database stability
that was needed. By using the Capital
software, the company reduced electrical
engineering change orders at production by
90%.

The Capital tool suite interface is easy and intuitive to

use, but underneath the hood, a complex and
sophisticated database coordinates a network of
relationships. Using the Capital tools, engineers can
model harness costs to the smallest detail and create
reports for comparing the costs of various design
choices in minutes. They can create detailed and accurate analyses of a wide range of layout concepts
within a few hours. Studying trade-offs quickly and accurately saves money and weight on every vehicle
and aircraft. Creating thousands, sometimes millions, of electrical designs for customer variants is
daunting; but with the Capital tools, component layout and wiring can be optimized simultaneously
across thousands of builds across a platform program, which results in better and cheaper designs.
Better design quality cuts costs and risks.
MEETING REQUIREMENTS
The Capital tool suite provides customizable design process control to establish verifiable and traceable
release processes and design revisions. It also enforces specified constraints using design rule checks.
Once the manufacturers specifications are incorporated into the Capital tools, process and revision
control is automated.
DETECTING PROBLEMS EARLY
Easy-to-use simulation provided by the Capital tool suite means that designs can be tested before the
hardware stage and a problem can be identified early, when its less expensive to fix. The Capital tools
provide rigorous failure-mode effect analysis to identify problems that might only be found by a
customer, at a huge cost to the manufacturers reputation and profit.
MATURING DATA FROM EARLY DESIGN TO IMPLEMENTATION
Harness development is a transition point in the vehicle design and manufacturing process. Its the
environment in which critical design data matures into a buildable product. The Capital tool suite
supports this process by enabling and imposing digital continuity. It spans process stages ranging from
the earliest design effort (where electrical functional requirements and physical requirements are
captured) to implementation. The deliverable is a completed harness product with thorough
documentation to accompany it.

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Managing Electrical Complexity with a Platform Level Approach and Systems Engineering

MANAGE COMPLEXITY, AVOID COSTLY RECALLS AND DELAYS

Failure to recognize the special role that E/E systems play can lead to catastrophic results such as recalls
and delays that cost manufacturers dearly. For example, the Airbus wiring failure in the A380 jumbo jet
that led to significant profit loss could fundamentally be described as an inability to manage digital
continuity and the flow of information between mechanical and electrical engineers, from concept to
manufacturing to assembly.
Implementing a systems engineering approach can help vehicle manufacturers maintain quality and
profitability into the future. Interconnection is based on the capabilities of the whole being more than
the sum of the partsthe Capital tool suite showcases how components are interconnected, whether
they are software blocks or physical devices. The Capital tools enable successful change management by
providing digital continuity and design automation throughout the electrical platform, helping to
manage the complexity and challenge of ever-increasing electronics in vehicle designs.

FURTHER READING
Brett Hillhouses (IBM) comments, The Hansen Report On Automotive Electronics, September 2012
For more details on systems engineering: INCOSE www.incose.org
Case study examples at http://www.sebokwiki.org/1.0.1/index.php?title=Case_Studies
ProSTEP iViP Product Data Journal, 2012

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