>They understand the importance of software, but they do not understand software
But they know that. That was the idea behind Cariad. Having a new company, unburdened by what other parts of the company are doing, which is doing just software. Giving them the freedom to do things a different way has always been the intention.
What you are describing is not an automotive problem, it is a Europe wide problem. Software Engineers in Europe, in general, are pretty bad, often cling to outdated methodologies and tend to create overly complex and overly useless systems. There are hundreds of examples for this, throughout European industries and governments. "German engineering" has not translated into software at all.
Consider also the salaries of European Software Engineers, even in the most wealthy countries, like France and Germany, it averages around 50k to 60k, it is not the highly lucrative career it is (was?) in the US.
I am a German software engineer. I dunno, I see more under-engineering than overengineering. But I don't work in automotive, where they do, or used to, overengineer things pretty badly - and in pretty silly ways, too, i.e. not usually defensible in some reasonable way. Software salaries are actually pretty good for Europe now, as far as I know, especially... in automotive. But that still doesn't fix the culture. The inital Cariad CEO was just some nondescript car industry guy - they may have tried to have a different culture, but why put a guy in charge who represents the old culture? The current Cariad CEO is a mechanical engineer by education and previously worked in production and logistics. It's baffling. They can't be that stupid (right?), so I think it's mechanical engineering resisting a loss of power and importance.
>I dunno, I see more under-engineering than overengineering.
Really? Every large Software project I have seen from the inside was as total architectural mess.
>Software salaries are actually pretty good for Europe now, as far as I know, especially... in automotive.
Not compared to the US. In the US a software engineer in a good position makes exceptional money, especially compared to other engineers. In Germany that is not the case, especially in automotive, where salaries are often union negotiated and Engineers are all on identical pay scales.
>The inital Cariad CEO was just some nondescript car industry guy - they may have tried to have a different culture, but why put a guy in charge who represents the old culture? The current Cariad CEO is a mechanical engineer by education and previously worked in production and logistics. It's baffling. They can't be that stupid (right?), so I think it's mechanical engineering resisting a loss of power and importance.
I just think that there really isn't anybody else. Is there any person somewhere in the German industry who has the ability for leadership and great software expertise? The biggest Software company in Germany is SAP and surely, hiring some SAP manager would have been an even worse decision.
What you saw was just a standard mess - not over-engineering. Same thing that I often see.
Regarding the Cariad CEO, they could have hired someone from the US software industry or from a smaller company with a reputation for quality - these do exist, DeepL or Ableton for example (though leading such a small place must be quite different from a large place).
>Regarding the Cariad CEO, they could have hired someone from the US software industry or from a smaller company with a reputation for quality - these do exist, DeepL or Ableton for example (though leading such a small place must be quite different from a large place).
Maybe, but US people often do not understand German work culture. The Cariad CEO will have to deal with the IGM and be mindful of German labor laws and specific cultural norms.
But I do not think that you are wrong, but that the general bias to promote "one of their own" caused this.
> Software Engineers in Europe, in general, are pretty bad
> "German engineering" has not translated into software at all.
Anecdata: in my 10+ years experience, the worst UX, UI, code and SWEs I've seen, are all German. I'm not saying there's absolutely no good ones here and there, but in general it seems the love for a very complex written/spoken language (riddled with rules and exception) and bureaucracy has translated 100% into software. The interfaces, the code and coding style most of the times give me a 1980s vibe if I'm lucky, or just scare me off altogether in most cases. The code tends to be more complex, abstract, hard to read and comprehend, for no good reason.
Many of the things which work well for developing hardware or Mechatronics work terribly for Software. Hardware development is about rigorous processes, any change to a piece of hardware requires a very complex chain of people, as the impact often is hard to predict and will require changes to many other processes, e.g. manufacturing. I do not think this is the entire explanation though.
The US Software industry has succeeded because it is very open to rapid changes, which the nature of software allows, given the right environment.
>The code tends to be more complex, abstract, hard to read and comprehend, for no good reason.
That is exactly the incompetence I am talking about. This gets extremely bad if governments are developing software solutions, where they outsource to a variety of contractors, who all are somewhat incompetent, but together manage to create a real mess. A mess so bad that every user feels the jank.
But they know that. That was the idea behind Cariad. Having a new company, unburdened by what other parts of the company are doing, which is doing just software. Giving them the freedom to do things a different way has always been the intention.
What you are describing is not an automotive problem, it is a Europe wide problem. Software Engineers in Europe, in general, are pretty bad, often cling to outdated methodologies and tend to create overly complex and overly useless systems. There are hundreds of examples for this, throughout European industries and governments. "German engineering" has not translated into software at all.
Consider also the salaries of European Software Engineers, even in the most wealthy countries, like France and Germany, it averages around 50k to 60k, it is not the highly lucrative career it is (was?) in the US.