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AUTOMOTIVE SAFETY
MIPI A-PHY Specification Levels Up In-Vehicle

Connectivity

By Anne-Françoise Pelé

nnovation in advanced driver-assistance systems (ADAS), in-vehicle infotainment and autono- While A-PHY v1.1 doubled downlink
mous driving has made standardized interfaces more important than ever, as cameras, sensors bandwidth to up to 32 Gbps through support
and displays have grown in number, complexity, bandwidth and interoperability requirements. of Star Quad (STQ) cables, A-PHY v2.0 is
IThe MIPI Alliance has introduced MIPI A-PHY, the industry’s first standardized asymmetric being designed to reach these speeds per
long-reach SerDes specification, as well as the end-to-end MIPI Automotive SerDes Solutions lane, while increasing the uplink bandwidth
(MASS) connectivity framework to simplify the integration of cameras, sensors and displays with to 1.666 Gbps and expanding A-PHY secure
built-in functional safety, security and data protection. control. These capabilities poise A-PHY to
In a Q&A, the MIPI A-PHY working group chairs weighed in on the future of A-PHY and support emerging zonal architectures, greater
MASS. Edo Cohen of Valens and Raj Kumar Nagpal of Synopsys are co-chairs of the working software-defined–vehicle capabilities and
group, and Ariel Lasry of Qualcomm serves as vice chair. the modern automotive cockpit environ-
ment. At the same time, the working group
EE TIMES EUROPE: How will connected is committed to making no changes in the
cars benefit from the MIPI A-PHY specification’s upper layers to support com-
specification? What are the security patibility with the previous versions of A-PHY.
risks/threats, and what will the MIPI
A-PHY specification enable in terms of EETE: Is MIPI considering a compliance
functional safety and security? testing program for A-PHY? Could you
Raj Kumar Nagpal: The benefit of the please elaborate on those plans?
standardized asymmetric approach that MIPI Nagpal: Yes, the working group is exploring
delivers for the modern vehicle is multifac- a potential test program in recognition of the
eted. In point-to-point, daisy-chain or more automotive industry’s tremendous demands
advanced topologies, A-PHY delivers around functional safety throughout these
lightning-fast unidirectional data, systems and the unusually challenging design
embedded bidirectional control data and environment in terms of EMI.
optional power delivery—all over a single To do this, we are taking an incremental
cable. This slashes overhead in terms of approach and successfully completed the first
wiring, cost and weight requirements and Valens’s Edo Cohen phase of our A-PHY Compliance Pilot Pro-
positions designers to optimize imple- gram held in conjunction with MIPI Alliance’s
mentations for their use cases. It also has framework, of which A-PHY is the foundation, member meeting last October in Vancouver.
exceptional reliability (with a packet error streamlines integration of cameras, sensors In this pilot, a device under test was put
rate of just 10 for unprecedented reliability and displays, while also baking in functional through transmitter tests derived from the
–19
over the vehicle lifetime) and electromag- safety and security. Instead of relying on MIPI A-PHY Reference Compliance Test Suite,
netic interference (EMI) resilience, along proprietary SerDes solutions for long-reach with two different test equipment vendors.
with the scalability and flexibility to meet the links between peripheral components and Another member company served as the
gamut of automotive speed and design needs. electronic control units (ECUs) and crafting testing lab for the pilot. After review of the
Furthermore, in terms of integration, A-PHY their own solutions for functional safety, program by the MIPI Board of Directors, the
complements Ethernet, controller area net- automotive designers can realize supplier program was approved for an extension for
work (CAN), FlexRay and other backbones. choice, economies of scale and dramatically another event in the second quarter of 2023.
The entire end-to-end MASS connectivity reduced design complexity and cost, and they
benefit from a growing ecosystem of providers EETE: When do you expect the first
and test vendors. generation of cars equipped with MIPI
A-PHY to be on the roads?
EETE: The roadmap for MIPI A-PHY Cohen: MIPI members are continuing to
has been a key point of discussion. expand the ecosystem around A-PHY, which is
What’s ahead for the specification evidence of the enormous interest in advanc-
that the automotive industry needs to ing this solution and makes sense given the
understand today? tremendous growth in adoption in advanced
Edo Cohen: Doubling the speed and electronics and connectivity in automobiles.
enhancing A-PHY’s flexibility for future zonal This would seem to be supported in the
architectures are the key points to know about commitment of test vendors to the potential
the immediate-term roadmap. A-PHY v2.0 is compliance program and other developments,
planned for release in the latter half of 2023, such as the recent announcement of A-PHY
and the MIPI A-PHY working group’s goal is validation by the Japan Automotive Software
to provide OEMs and their Tier 1 suppliers Platform and Architecture (JASPAR) organi-
with a clear path forward for cost-efficient zation following tests conducted using Valens
Synopsys’s Raj Kumar Nagpal product innovation. Semiconductor chipsets.

MARCH 2023 | www.eetimes.eu