General Motors was ready to toast the 2023 holidays with the Chevrolet Blazer, as the perfect gift for mainstream EV buyers. Then the holiday lights went dark: Some owners saw the SUV’s infotainment screens blank out or flash error messages. A reviewer for InsideEVs was stranded in rural Virginia when his Blazer conked out during an Electrify America charge session.
The software snafu forced Chevy to issue a stop-sale order on the Blazer in December. It resumed sales in March, with prices slashed by as much as $6,500 to woo buyers, to as little as $50,195.
Welcome to the wacky world of the “software-defined vehicle”: Cars with more lines of code than a Boeing Dreamliner, to manage EV batteries or semi-autonomous chores, juggle apps and subscription services, and download updates over-the-air—ideally, without going on the fritz. That last part is vexing automakers from Tesla to Ford, and now GM. Volkswagen ousted chief executive Herbert Diess after issues at VW’s troubled Cariad software unit delayed rollouts of Audi, Porsche, and Bentley models by as much as two years. Ford recently recalled nearly 9,000 Maverick hybrids over software that could cause the pint-sized pickup to shift into neutral unexpectedly. That followed a recall of 242,000 Mavericks due to a Body Control Module that could prevent taillights from lighting up.
“It was a… culture shift and wakeup call. Everyone owned quality, but no one owned it beyond their four walls.” —Abdul Bazzi, GM
I just spent a week driving a 2024 Blazer EV after its digital do-over. For what it’s worth, I can report that my Blazer, including its Google-partnered infotainment—running on a 28-cm driver’s display, and a snazzy 45-cm infotainment touchscreen—worked without a hitch or glitch. The same went for home and DC charging sessions, including a midnight hookup with an Electrify America station in Providence, R.I.
The story of how GM got the Blazer back on the road includes some classic road trips. Engineers set off on “Four Corners” test drives across the continental U.S. in about 40 Blazer EVs. Each SUV covered up to 400 miles a day, with a second engineer riding shotgun and instrumented testing in various terrains and climates, and the ability to troubleshoot on-the-spot. Those engineers experienced some of the same screen issues as customers, but reported no charging problems.
GM says they’re adding hundreds of networked lab benches to develop increasingly complex vehicle software. John F. Martin/General Motors
Next, GM dramatically scaled up lab bench testing at its Eero Saarinen-designed Tech Center in suburban Detroit, growing from about 70 benches to 300. Additional test labs have been added in company tech centers, including its Silicon Valley hub in Mountain View, Calif.
Where hardware-centric cars are characterized by dozens of separate, independent controllers, software-defined vehicles demand a more integrated approach. Company executives say that was part of the Blazer’s problem, with software bugs arising late in a fast-moving project as discrete systems came together in a finished machine.
GM breaks down silo
Abdul Bazzi, GM vice-president of software quality, says the automaker’s test benches—and in a way, human engineers themselves—had previously been overly standalone, siloed units. In one example, a bench might include a car’s infotainment module, linked to other test components in standalone desktop form. Now, he says, new benches are all being networked, including remote access and webcam access to screen activity, to help engineers, designers, and executives collaborate and stay abreast of developments.
“It was a … culture shift and wakeup call,” Bazzi says. “Everyone owned quality, but no one owned it beyond their four walls.”
Now, Bazzi says, “If you’re a developer in, say, the infotainment space, you can log into benches anywhere around the world.”
Bazzi says GM’s tech-heavy Ultium EVs are approaching a jaw-dropping 20 million lines of code. And these networked benches aim to help GM catch and address issues in specific component sets, before vehicles are built. GM is already bench testing upcoming EVs like the Cadillac Celestiq ultra-luxury sedan, three-row Escalade IQ SUV, and GMC Sierra EV pickup—even as fully built engineering prototypes are in short supply.
The Blazer is back in business—and hopefully free of further bugs.
GM is also keeping work humming 24/7, even when vehicles are sitting idle. (Don’t tell the robot union.) Using tools built on Raspberry Pi, camera-equipped test vehicles can switch to automated tests when engineers aren’t driving them, and send fault notifications to appropriate teams. GM, the top auto seller in the U.S. in 2023, and the world’s fifth largest by volume, has about 29 global vehicle development programs in the works, and the program is monitoring all those models undergoing real-world testing, from logging mileage to knowing when ignitions are switched on or off.
Some labs are fully dedicated to the booming infotainment space, with its long development times, demands for regular updates, and heavy scrutiny from finicky customers and media testers. Other labs focus on full electrical integration for upcoming models.
Returning Blazer to form
Seeing GM shoot itself in the foot on EVs is a shame, because the Blazer is otherwise a strikingly designed, smooth-performing, and well-engineered EV; enough to win Motor Trend’s coveted “SUV of the Year” award. (If you’re wondering, the Chevy won the award before the software glitch that halted sales and stalled showroom momentum.)
A major software bug hobbled the Blazer’s infotainment screens and forced months of re-engineering earlier this year.Chevrolet
Even with the smaller of two available Ultium nickel-manganese cobalt batteries—a pouch-format 85 kWh for all-wheel-drive models, and 102 kWh for rear-drive versions—my AWD Blazer RS was on pace to exceed its 449-km (279-mile) EPA range estimate. That’s despite a brawny set of 21-inch wheels on my Blazer RS test model. That mid-priced Blazer version starts from $57,595, with an available $7,500 federal Clean Vehicle Credit knocking the price to $50,095.
Rear-wheel-drive Blazers up driving range to an official 521 kilometers (324 miles), and I’m convinced a light-footed driver can surpass that in the real world. A maximum 190-kilowatt fast-charging rate trails the speediest Teslas, Hyundais, or Porsches. But it’s quick enough to add 125 km (78 miles) of driving range in 10 minutes on the strongest DC fast chargers. Those pouch-style batteries use 70-percent less cobalt than in the previous-gen Chevy Bolt.
A forthcoming Blazer SS will crank up a zesty 410 kilowatts (557 horsepower), good for a 0-100 kph sprint (0-62 mph) in about four seconds. That Blazer SS will also offer a software-heavy GM system that, inexplicably to me, isn’t already standard or optional on every model in the corporate stable: The Super Cruise system seems the industry’s best semi-autonomous Level 2 tech, offering safe, transparent hands-free operation on 400,000 miles of highways in the U.S. and Canada, backed by a driver-monitoring camera and high-precision Lidar mapping. That compares with a Tesla Autopilot or Full Self-Driving that still demands hands-on monitoring, and is facing regulatory scrutiny and lawsuits due to fatal accidents and injuries, and years of Elon Musk’s Barnumesque promises.
As for software, GM has taken serious grief over its decision to mimic Tesla and not offer Apple CarPlay and Android Auto in the Blazer, features many smartphone-addicted users take for granted. I wouldn’t be surprised to see GM eventually reverse course on that front, driven by popular demand (or outcry). If it’s any consolation, the Google-based touchscreen UI in the Chevy’s handsome cabin is pleasing and intuitive, including a crisply rendered Google Maps, the voice-based Google Assistant, and apps including Spotify. Google also delivers a better mapping-and-navigation environment than anything Apple has cooked up, including this well-integrated onboard version that can help coordinate electric trips with available range and charging stations.
Perhaps Google can spread the word that the Blazer is back in business—and hopefully free of further bugs. The bigger industry picture, flashed on screens around the world, is this: Legacy automakers, after a century of expertise in gasoline engines, transmissions, and hardware, are still being challenged by the leap to software-dominated mobility.
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