Automotive electronics

Automotive electronics are electronic systems used in vehicles, including engine management, ignition, radio, carputers, telematics, in-car entertainment systems, and others. Ignition, engine and transmission electronics are also found in trucks, motorcycles, off-road vehicles, and other internal combustion powered machinery such as forklifts, tractors and excavators. Related elements for control of relevant electrical systems are also found on hybrid vehicles and electric cars. Electronic systems have become an increasingly large component of the cost of an automobile, from only around 1% of its value in 1950 to around 30% in 2010. Modern electric cars rely on power electronics for the main propulsion motor control, as well as managing the battery system. Future autonomous cars will rely on powerful computer systems, an array of sensors, networking, and satellite navigation, all of which will require electronics. The earliest electronic systems available as factory installations were vacuum tube car radios, starting in the early 1930s. The development of semiconductors after World War II greatly expanded the use of electronics in automobiles, with solid-state diodes making the automotive alternator the standard after about 1960, and the first transistorized ignition systems appearing in 1963. The emergence of metal–oxide–semiconductor (MOS) technology led to the development of modern automotive electronics. The MOSFET (MOS field-effect transistor, or MOS transistor), invented by Mohamed M. Atalla and Dawon Kahng at Bell Labs in 1959, led to the development of the power MOSFET by Hitachi in 1969, and the single-chip microprocessor by Federico Faggin, Marcian Hoff, Masatoshi Shima and Stanley Mazor at Intel in 1971. The development of MOS integrated circuit (MOS IC) chips and microprocessors made a range of automotive applications economically feasible in the 1970s.