TASKING and Synopsys to provide safer automotive ECUs

1 min read

TASKING's debugging tools now support the Synopsys VDK (Virtualizer Development Kit) and Silver virtual ECU (Electronic Control Unit) platforms.

Developers will now be able to access a comprehensive suite of tools that increase development efficiency while improving vehicle safety and reliability, while reducing time-to-market and increasing the quality of software in vehicles.

TASKING tools provide comprehensive debugging, timing, and coverage analysis and provide in-depth insights into ECUs and embedded RTOS, with a focus on AUTOSAR.

The Synopsys Virtualizer and Silver software environments allow for simulation of ECUs on different hardware abstraction levels from Level 4 (Virtualizer, VDKs) to abstractions on Level 1-3 (Silver) according to the prostep virtual ECU categorization.

In addition, the Synopsys tooling enables co-simulation with models of different tools (e.g., MATLAB / Simulink, Dymola, SimulationX, MapleSim, AMEsim, GT-Power, axisuite) and integrates into automotive workflows to frontload integration, validation, and debugging. The use of virtual ECUs creates an environment for the development and validation of automotive software.

By integrating TASKING's debugging tools with Synopsys Silver, users can switch between virtual and physical ECUs. The same tools and automation scripts can be used without changing the user's process. In this way, the tools enable developers to identify and fix potential errors and security vulnerabilities early on, which significantly improves vehicle safety and reliability.

Commenting Christoph Herzog, CTO of TASKING, said, “The integration of TASKING debuggers with Synopsys virtual prototyping solutions is an important step towards a safer future for the automotive industry. The integration of our solutions enables manufacturers to develop their products faster and more efficiently.”

“The automotive industry is accelerating software-defined vehicle validation through the deployment of Synopsys solutions for Electronics Digital Twins,” said Tom De Schutter, Vice President of Engineering for the Systems Design Group at Synopsys. “The integration of Synopsys Silver and Virtualizer with TASKING debugging tools delivers a seamless solution for software engineers to accelerate software development and time-to-market for their advanced automotive systems.”

The collaboration between TASKING and Synopsys started back in 2021 and since then, TASKING's debugging tools in combination with vECUs created with Synopsys virtual prototyping solutions have been successfully deployed in the field.

The integration is now available to all users and enables automotive manufacturers to significantly accelerate ECU development and testing.