GM is leveraging major advancements in virtual vehicle development to accelerate its product development process for the 2023 Cadillac LYRIQ.
The development of the Cadillac LYRIQ signals a fundamental shift in the way GM develops vehicles. While previously, vehicles were modeled in clay, built out in rough form, and tested in real-life situations, the company is quickly moving to a mostly virtual development process.
In the case of the LYRIQ, Cadillac is was able to condense the engineering process so much through virtual development, the brand debuted the production version of the vehicle nine months ahead of schedule. By shortening development time, the company is also reducing development costs. GM expects more virtual development to save the company $1.5-billion per year going forward.
The use of the Ultium Battery Platform has further decreased engineering time due to its modular design.
GM’s examples of elements in the engineering of the LYRIQ that directly benefited from virtual design, engineering, and validation include:
- Cabin comfort for all passengers in cold and hot environments
- Advanced aerodynamics to help maximize range and on-road performance
- Aeroacoustics and active road noise cancellation for a more enjoyable ride
- Driver assistance and active safety features for peace of mind
- Protection of the Ultium battery in a wide variety of collision scenarios
“While GM has been developing great products for more than 100 years, virtual engineering has allowed us to visualize aspects of our designs that have not been previously observable with conventional vehicle testing. This is one of many inherent strengths of virtual engineering that we’ve capitalized on to completely reimagine how we create and develop future mobility products like the Cadillac LYRIQ,” explained Mike Anderson, GM executive director of Virtual Design, Development and Validation. “This new approach certainly achieved our initial goal of drastically reducing our engineering spend on expensive prototypes, but, more importantly, has enabled us to run faster than ever before, and deliver better quality on our first production vehicle builds.”
The 2023 Cadillac LYRIQ will go into production in early 2022 with reservations opening up in September 2021 and sales starting during the first half of 2022.
