New centre of excellence for autonomous driving
BMW officially opens its autonomous driving campus in
Unterschleißheim near Munich.
Munich. The BMW Group today celebrated the official
opening of its autonomous driving campus in Unterschleißheim. Klaus
Fröhlich, Member of the Board of Management of BMW AG responsible for
Development and Research, and Bavarian state premier Markus Söder were
present for the inauguration of a forward-looking development facility
that showcases the BMW Group’s transformation into a tech company.
The BMW Group’s campus for autonomous driving is a state-of-the-art
centre of excellence that covers every base when it comes to offering
greater capacity for innovation and increased development efficiency –
and ultimately securing the company’s future sustainability.
15 months ago, the BMW Group took the decision to pool together its
development expertise in the fields of vehicle connectivity and highly
/ fully automated driving at a single location. The campus, which
offers 23,000 square metres of office space with room for 1,800
employees, was completed in record time. The site’s optimum
infrastructure, its proximity to the Research and Innovation Centre,
and the nearby link to the motorway network helped to swing
the decision in its favour.
The BMW Group is intending to drive forward development of
highly automated vehicles with the new campus in Unterschleißheim,
and is looking to recruit IT specialists and software developers in
the areas of artificial intelligence, machine learning and data analysis.
New working environments
The autonomous driving campus is opening its doors to « new
working environments » – i.e. an open-plan layout, intelligent and
flexible use of office space, and a multifaceted and creative
workplace. The benefits for the development experts employed here are
clear: flexibility, efficiency, a high level of autonomy and short
distances. This means, for example, that a software developer working
at the new campus can immediately test out freshly written code in a
vehicle that is just a short walk away.
New working environments go hand in hand with a new employee and
management culture, and managers work in the same open-plan office
spaces as their staff. This enhances interaction and facilitates
communications, resulting in effective teamwork in the development of
highly complex products.
Campus leads the way in agile working methods
The BMW Group is the first company in the automotive industry to
apply the agile working model systematically and universally for an
entire specialist area – in this case across autonomous driving and
driver assistance, from the research phase all the way through to
series production development. Agile working models form a crucial
basis for efficient, future-proof development.
The open campus structure offers excellent conditions and exceptional
support for scrum teams, and therefore lends itself perfectly to the
agile software development process. Scrum teams have an
interdisciplinary structure, meaning that a variety of skills are
brought together. They handle complex sub-processes, working
independently with an end-to-end approach. The high degree of
flexibility allows the teams to react quickly and effectively to new requirements.
This is a time of disruptive change in the automotive industry, with
the arrival of new players making the competitive environment ever
more challenging. The pace of innovation is accelerating rapidly and
young professionals cite future viability, a modern working
environment and flexible, agile workflows as key to an employer’s
attractiveness. A cutting-edge development facility such as the new
campus for autonomous driving therefore represents a crucial asset for
the company’s long-term sustainability and innovative capability.
In the event of enquiries please contact:
Corporate Communications
Bernhard Ederer, Design- and Techcommunicatios
[email protected] Tel.: +49 89 382-28556
Daria Nikitina, Business and Financial Communications,
[email protected] Tel.: +49 89 382-60340
Internet: www.press.bmw.de
E-mail: [email protected]
