CANNoC: An open-source NoC architecture for ECU consolidation

Modern cars contain more than 50 electronic control units (ECUs) whose number is expected to grow as more and more features are incorporated. The concept of one feature per ECU is contributing to this growth which increases the car kerb weight leading to lower fuel efficiency. Researchers have proposed ECU consolidation to addresses this issue by combining multiple ECUs on the same chip. This paper discusses the implementation of a network on chip (NoC) architecture which enables integrating multiple ECUs on a reconfigurable chip (FPGA) and interfacing it with a standard CAN network. The architecture enables reducing the number of ECUs required for non-critical functions and lower communication overhead to the main bus.