features on new models at a much lower cost than legacy car companies. Tyre pressure sensors are a good example of this.
South Africa ' s diverse road surfaces, from potholed B-roads to corrugated Karoo dirt roads, make the need for tyre pressure monitoring systems very real. To prevent being stranded with a blowout that could have been prevented by stopping and changing a slowly deflating tyre in time.
Tyre pressure sensors aren ' t visible to car buyers. They have no merit in external design differentiation. Therefore, all manufacturers should use the same form factor and technical specification. The tyre pressure monitor is a technology component that ' s also a commodity, like fasteners.
But many legacy car companies source and integrate tyre pressure sensors at high cost to their own specifications. This is so wasteful because the core features and specifications should be standardised across the industry to reduce costs and complexity.
Legacy car companies are struggling to execute SDVs because they require uncomfortable decisions about in-house senior engineering roles. There are many valuable, experienced, and long-serving senior automotive engineers managing new-model development programs who don ' t have the skills or insight to deliver an SDV successfully.
In China, due to the obsession with software engineering and digital architectures throughout engineering education, there are tens of thousands of engineers with extensive experience in SDVs.
Rethinking suppliers
The other issue for legacy car companies is that unlocking the benefits of SDVs requires exiting many of their current suppliers. These supplier relationships trace back decades.
Many legacy tier 1 suppliers in the American and European automotive ecosystem have pioneered successful technologies and features for automakers. But some are proving incapable of making the full transition to SDVs.
Without the software engineering and development experience of Chinese technical teams, those onceinvaluable American and European suppliers risk becoming redundant and irrelevant. OEMs need futureproof software-defined systems that can evolve and adapt over time, integrating emerging technologies as they become available.
SDVs are not about more in-cabin screens. In fact, the overreach of replacing traditional in-car controls with screen-based functions has backfired badly for all automakers, including Chinese automakers.
Ease of integration
Enforced standardisation of technology components that aren ' t visible to buyers has been a secret power for the Chinese auto industry. It has allowed Chinese car companies to source from a highly competitive domestic supplier base that doesn ' t have to worry about the complexity of form factors, electronic architectures, and integration issues.
There ' s a lot of talk about the software-defined vehicle( SDV), but there ' s no clear understanding of what it means. The issues for legacy OEMs are that there ' s no evolution into software-defined vehicle architectures; it requires a completely new platform design and engineering integration approach. That requires new components and integration standards.
What SDVs are about is keeping vehicles seamlessly functioning and up to date. With background sensors analysing vehicle use and wear, and avoiding points of preventable failure. By using over-theair updates to solve issues or update features, or linking vehicle owners to the nearest service workshop seamlessly to address a pending mechanical issue before it escalates.
In theory, SDVs dramatically reduce lingering issues and allow for real-time diagnostics and proactive updates. But they could also ringfence future serviceability for vehicles in the automotive aftermarket.
There is a risk that OEMs could raise tooling and digital platform requirements to a level where many experienced workshops, and service suppliers, can’ t afford to offer thirdparty maintenance or servicing.
JUNE 2026 27 WORDS IN ACTION