Evolving car designs using model-based automated safety analysis and optimisation techniques

Development processes in the automotive industry need to evolve to address increasing demands for integration of car functions over common networked infrastructures. New processes must address cost and safety concerns and maximize the potential for automation to address the problem of increasing technological complexity. In this paper, we propose a design process in which techniques for semi-automatic safety and reliability analysis of systems models are combined with multi-objective optimisation techniques to assist the gradual development of designs that can meet reliability and safety requirements and maximise profit within pragmatic development cost constraints. The proposed process relies on tools to automate some aspects of the design that we believe could be automated and thus simplified without loss of the creative input brought in the process by designers. (C) 2004 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.