Category: Automotive – Sponsored by Advanced Propulsion Centre UK
Project: evovlAD
Partners: Nissan with Connected Places Catapult, Humanising Autonomy, SBD Automotive and TRL
As the UK pushes to turn connected and autonomous vehicle research into deployable, scalable technology, the evolvAD programme has emerged as a flagship example of how industry collaboration can move the sector closer to real-world adoption.
This year’s winner of the C2I Awards Automotive category set out to tackle one of the industry’s biggest barriers: enabling Connected and Autonomous Vehicles (CAVs) to operate reliably across a wide variety of everyday environments, while strengthening a home-grown supply chain capable of supporting commercial rollout in the UK and international markets.
At its core, evolvAD has combined vehicle engineering, digital infrastructure, communications and safety expertise to develop solutions that go beyond tightly defined test conditions. By focusing on scalability and cross-sector integration, the programme aims not only to advance autonomous driving capability, but also to provide UK suppliers with the performance benchmarks and technical direction needed to compete in a rapidly evolving global market.
Partners in the project where Nissan, SBD Automotive, TRL and the Connected Places Catapult, with Humanising Autonomy involved earlier in the project before it was dissolved. All partners have worked on previous CAV programs (notably HumanDrive and ServCity) and have experience to build, develop, and test Autonomous Vehicles (AV) by utilising local infrastructure/mapping data and V2X communication to enable connected car autonomous vehicle journeys.
The UK automotive industry is expected to grow significantly by 2030, with SAE L4/5 automated vehicles anticipated to form a growing segment by 2040. Most AV developments have been characterised by focusing on localised Operational Design Domains (ODDs), resulting in smaller-scale deployments and limited supply chain scale. evolvAD was conceived to address this challenge: to develop a multi-ODD ADS capable of operating in dynamic urban and rural environments and to create supply chain performance specifications that prepare UK suppliers for future opportunities across a range of services.
Scale and collaboration are required to support a thriving UK supply chain, providing visibility of performance requirements for communications, data infrastructure, AI, mapping, cyber security, simulation, testing, and ADS stack development.
evolvAD developed and validated Autonomous Drive Systems (ADS) encompassing a range of complex UK based ODDs in urban settings. In the urban residential portion, the consortium used the Smart Mobility Living Laboratory (SMLL), an established UK test bed for Autonomous Vehicles, funded by the Centre for Connected and Autonomous Vehicles (CCAV), to further advance Vehicle to Infrastructure (V2I) and I2V communication. This enabled a smoother transition of the vehicle down narrow winding streets with parked vehicles, speed humps, negotiating roundabouts, and crossings without endangering other vulnerable road users and pedestrians.
A central output of the evolvAD project has been the development of validated performance specifications to facilitate the supply chain.
Nirav Shah, Autonomous Vehicles Research Engineer at Nissan Technical Centre Europe and lead Software Engineer for the urban package, explained the urban advancements:
“For the urban [environment] , we utilised infrastructure information, and that allowed us to see, not only whatever sensors can see, but also from the infrastructure cameras, of what’s ahead. So we can make a bit more of an advanced driver-like decision, or even better than that sometimes, because the ADS can utilise infrastructure information to make quicker decisions.”
“Sensors could see much far away, and that allowed us to decide whether we can negotiate and get into the road – not in the parked area of the road, – but on the driving area of the road much earlier. So that was one of the big challenges, which we solved using the infrastructure in our vehicle, so getting the data from infrastructure in our vehicle and utilising it for advanced decision making.”
In rural areas, evolving conditions – higher dynamic speeds, camber and unpaved sections – presented a different form of challenge.
“The more challenging part was not only the slow speed, but also the high dynamic speed which we have [on rural roads] , and the roads in the countryside are having more camber, as well as quite a lot of unpaved area, so let’s say that was quite a big challenge,” Shah explained. “We utilised steer-by-wire and brake-by-wire technology to enable us to drive at such a high speed as the road limit, approximately around 55mph, and also allowed us to be within the grip limit, so that was quite good.”
Robert Bateman, Manager – Vehicle Research and Advanced Engineering at Nissan Technical Centre Europe, added: “The drive-by-wire and steer-by-wire capability was developed within a Nissan owned vehicle. So we own the vehicle, and we developed that so that [it] integrated with our own software stack as well, and we were able to deliver this comfortable, dynamic drive.”
A central output of the evolvAD project has been the development of validated performance specifications to facilitate the supply chain. These specifications inform components relating to perception software, mapping AI, cyber security and testing.
evolvAD piloted these specifications through physical testing and requirement piloting in partnership with CPC, SBD and TRL, ensuring that UK suppliers are able to engage with future AV platforms. The project also piloted in-use monitoring requirements, with TRL acting as a proxy regulator to assess an Authorised Self-Driving Entity (ASDE).
As the vehicle provider, Nissan integrated developed technologies with infrastructure and communications, enabling the creation and testing of ADS across urban and rural settings. Nissan’s R&AE team at Cranfield, Bedfordshire, brought experienced engineers, working alongside Nissan’s global research capabilities.
With a mission to create clean, efficient transport that is safe, reliable and accessible, TRL’s long legacy in transport research and innovation provided invaluable testbed management and regulatory insight. The organisation manages the Smart Mobility Living Laboratory and supported in-use monitoring assessment methodologies.
SBD contributed cyber and safety case expertise, including validating test methodologies for emergent cyber threats and training six graduates in cyber security competencies as part of the project’s development.
CPC applied machine learning and AI techniques to produce High-Definition maps for multiple test sites, building on ServCity work. CPC also contributed to characterisation of ODDs.
Earlier in the project, Humanising Technology supported efforts to combine engineering methodologies with human behaviour modelling, enhancing the AV system’s ability to anticipate vulnerable road user movement.
evolvAD’s outputs support a range of organisations by developing performance specifications, testing and validation methodologies, and real-world multi-domain ADS capability. This infrastructure of knowledge, capability and supply chain readiness is essential for achieving at-scale deployment of advanced autonomous vehicles in the UK and beyond.
