GENIVI Alliance to Sponsor Public Open-Source Community Projects for Automotive IVI Software

SAN RAMON,Calif., Sept. 19, 2012 -- The GENIVI Alliance, an automotive and consumer electronics industry association driving the development and adoption of an open In-vehicle Infotainment (IVI) reference platform, today announced that its component development will be moving to all-new Alliance-sponsored public open-source community projects.

All the code specified for GENIVI compliance is, and will continue to be comprised of open-source licensed components. Today, 95% of the software components for GENIVI compliance are already adopted or adapted from existing open-source projects.

When the Alliance was initially unable to find a home in the community for some components, GENIVI had originally developed that software "in-house." Through these newly created sponsored projects, the components now will be developed in the FOSS (Free and Open-Source Software) community.

The first three projects are Layer Manager, Audio Manager and Automotive DLT (Diagnostic Log and Trace). Further technical information on these projects can be found at www.genivi.org.

During his keynote address at The Linux Foundation's Automotive Linux Summit in Gaydon, England, Matt Jones, vice president, GENIVI and technical lead for Next Generation Infotainment Systems, Jaguar Land Rover, commented, "By moving our previously internal code development activities into the public open-source community model, GENIVI hopes to simplify contribution from its members and to engage individual contributors in the FOSS community who are not members. The benefit for open source developers is freely available access to advanced automotive software, an opportunity to directly contribute to its development, and a clear path for adoption of this technology by related industries." He continued, "The benefit for GENIVI is an increased level of interest and activity towards achieving the Alliance's goal of a common software infrastructure for IVI."

The Linux Foundation, the nonprofit consortium dedicated to fostering the growth of Linux and FOSS, will provide the professional services to host all of the GENIVI sponsored projects.

"By providing GENIVI with centralized resources for hosting its code, we can help to increase collaboration throughout the Linux and open source community," said Jim Zemlin, executive director, The Linux Foundation.

All of the projects will be maintained by GENIVI throughout their life within the open-source environment. When deemed beneficial, GENIVI can also merge specific projects with other existing, successful projects in the community to further foster development.

Additionally, the Alliance will also sponsor new "incubation" projects for automotive IVI software in the open-source community. These projects will encourage development of experimental or early-stage technologies that are consistent with the Alliance's mission and technical scope, but not currently part of the GENIVI compliance specification.

About GENIVI Alliance
The GENIVI Alliance is a non-profit industry association whose mission is to drive the broad adoption of an In-Vehicle Infotainment (IVI) open source development platform. GENIVI will accomplish this by aligning requirements, delivering reference implementations, offering certification programs and fostering a vibrant open source IVI community. GENIVI's work will result in shortened development cycles, quicker time-to-market, and reduced costs for companies developing IVI equipment and software. Comprised of more than 165 member companies, GENIVI is headquartered in San Ramon, Calif.