European CHASSIS Program reaches major milestone in chiplet development

Revolutionizing the automotive semiconductor landscape

June 15, 2026 -- The CHASSIS initiative (Chiplet-based Hardware Architectures for Software-Defined Vehicles) has started the implementation of the Automotive Base Die, a critical 5nm chiplet that is funded by project partners BMW, imec, and Bosch and supported by the CHASSIS consortium partners.

This marks a significant milestone towards establishing an open and standardized chiplet ecosystem for the next generation of software-defined vehicles.

An open chiplet ecosystem is vital for the automotive industry, as it fosters competition and lowers market entry barriers. This strategy delivers key benefits like scalability, the creation of diverse platform variants, and accelerated time-to-market.

A key target of the CHASSIS project is the chiplet-based SoC prototype development, which is crucial for validating the technical feasibility and market acceptance supporting new vehicle features. In the core of this approach is the Automotive Base Die, which provides a standardized, modular hardware foundation for a flexible and centralized vehicle architecture that can be easily configured for specific functions.

The Automotive Base Die acts as the central communication and integration hub for automotive System-on-Chip (SoC) infrastructure. Designed as a 5nm chiplet, it features robust automotive interfaces for sensors and I/O, along with essential basic compute capabilities tailored for automotive workloads. Crucially, its design enables seamless integration of third-party chiplets via the Universal Chiplet Interconnect Express (UCIe) standard, fostering unprecedented flexibility and innovation.

This groundbreaking design is the result of a powerful collaborative effort between leading European entities:

By consistently engineering premium vehicle innovations, BMW is playing a decisive role in reviewing and shaping the die specifications, ensuring they precisely meet the demanding requirements of future automotive applications.

Leveraging its semiconductor expertise, imec contributes critical learnings from its Automotive Chiplet Program (ACP) and extensive ecosystem interactions into the project. Imec’s focus is ensuring the Automotive Base Die possesses the necessary flexibility to achieve broad interoperability across a diverse, multi-vendor chiplet landscape.

Leveraging its profound semiconductor and automotive system-level expertise, Bosch guides the design process, ensuring strict adherence to industry standards and the fulfilment of CHASSIS objectives to lay the groundwork for an open chiplet ecosystem. Bosch also delivered the foundational specification for the Automotive Base Die.

Beyond its immediate technical advantages, the Automotive Base Die design serves several strategic objectives for the European semiconductor landscape. It not only enhances critical design expertise in the region, it also attracts top-tier semiconductor designers to Europe. At the same time, it shapes the foundation for the creation of a multi-vendor chiplet architecture and achieves an open integration die design, promoting broad adoption and continuous innovation. The design freeze is targeted for end of 2026.