Antoine Dubois is the Functional Safety Manager / Architect for high-end Automotive MPU at NXP Semiconductors, working on the next generation safety microprocessor for future electric vehicle as well as the  autonomous driving application. Antoine explained that with automated systems it is critical to map out all the ways that an automated system could fail to keep people and their surroundings safe, and integrate into the hardware designs feedback systems that prevent the vehicle from entering into one of thous conditions. At the same time designers conceptualize the design, they also conceptualize all the things that could go wrong. 

A traction inverter is one of the main components of an Electric vehicle, converting DC power from the High-Voltage battery to the 3-Phase AC Power of the electric Motor.  The functional safety concept was demonstrated for the traction inverter system from Safety Goal to hardware safety requirements, in order to prevent failure of such systems from harming the driver and/or its surrounding environment.

The team identified 4 traction hazards and 3 breaking hazards. They then designed the hardware called a safety manager that would watch for those aberrations and interact with the vehicle systems to prevent consequences. He gave an example of the Motor Control Safety mechanism (torque estimator) being performed inset the Safety Core to verify the control loop. Each of the hazards had separate safety mechanisms outside, but integrated with the working mechanism to prevent unsafe conditions

Antoine previously worked with EV makers in France, Michigan and California to develop automotive safety-compliant applications such as traction inverters, battery management systems, Gateway and autonomous driving systems.