Let’s hope this is true. Automobiles are a platform for innovation for technology companies just as is the case with other tech platforms, but far from being open source or even documented, a lot of the inner control logic for automobile electronics has to be reverse engineered.

Standardizing automobile operating systems not only decreases the costs for automakers and improves reliability, but also opens up the market for technology extension and integration by third party developers.

Toyota, Hitachi, Nissan, Honda, Denso, Toshiba, Panasonic, and other Japanese automakers and electrical machinery manufacturers are joining forces to develop a common software infrastructure for automobile electronic control systems by year-end, the Nikkei says. Seventy-three firms will take part in the efforts to standardize software specifications; and an additional fifty or so companies plan to adopt the standardized software.

[From At Long Last: A Standard O/S For Cars | The Truth About Cars]