Body (Zone) Domain Controller and Chip Industry Research Report,2025
Body (Zone) Domain Research: ZCU Installation Exceeds 2 Million Units, Evolving Towards a "Plug-and-Play" Modular Platform
The body (zone) domain covers BCM (Body Control Module), BDC (Body Domain Controller), and ZCU (Zone Controller). From the perspective of the control systems they manage, the functional integration is becoming increasingly high:
BCM controls body auxiliary electrical appliances such as doors, windows, lights, rearview mirrors, and wipers, and can generally directly drive actuators. The number of BCMs in a vehicle ranges from 1 to 2.
BDC drives lower-level modules, such as lighting modules, door modules, seat modules, thermal management modules, etc. Different manufacturers have different body control strategies, so the functional integration is not completely consistent. Some will integrate functions such as air conditioning thermal management, gateways, TPMS, etc., while others exist in the form of separate body domain controllers and gateways. The number of BDCs in a vehicle varies from 1 to 3.
ZCU is a zone controller divided according to physical location. In addition to body control functions, it can also integrate gateway, power distribution, and some chassis domain and powertrain domain functions across domains, replacing the original ECUs with a single MCU with strong computing power. According to the current plans of various OEMs, the number of ZCUs in a vehicle ranges from 2 to 4.
As a key role in the transformation of automotive electronic and electrical architecture (EEA), ZCU is leading the industry to a new stage of development. It integrates the functions of multiple originally scattered electronic control units (ECUs) and centrally manages and controls related systems according to the physical zones or functional domains of the vehicle.
According to ResearchInChina, in 2024, the market size of the body (zone) (including traditional BCM, BDC, and ZCU) domain in Chinese passenger car market will exceed 15.62 billion yuan. Among them, in 2024, the penetration rate of ZCU has reached 8.83%, with an installation of over 2 million units and a market size of 3.93 billion yuan. In the future, ZCU will become the largest market growth driver.
Under the trends of reducing costs and increasing efficiency of the entire vehicle and automotive intelligence, zone controllers have become an inevitable trend. The main development directions of zone controllers include:
Trend 1: MCU Less Technology
Hardware Integration: Replace scattered low-end MCUs with multi-core high-performance MCUs. The cost of a single multi-core MCU is 40% lower than that of multiple low-end MCUs. For example, the MCU Less intelligent drivers of Marelli/Texas Instruments/STMicroelectronics have completely migrated the headlight control software to the domain controller, supporting OTA updates of dynamic lighting scenes.
Power Consumption Reduction: Integrated design reduces redundant circuits, and energy consumption decreases by 20%.
Software Definition: Dynamically schedule atomic services by the central HPC through the SOA architecture, reducing the dependence on local MCUs and supporting OTA seamless upgrades.
Trend 2: Edge AI Computing
Edge Computing: The main control MCU of the zone controller is equipped with an AI acceleration core (such as ARM CMSIS-NN) to achieve localized image recognition and decision-making.
Trend 3: Smart Power Devices such as SmartFET
Functional Integration: Replace traditional MOSFETs, integrate overcurrent/overheat protection and current monitoring, and be used for power management of ZCU (such as LED lighting, motor control).
Scene Adaptation: Support three types of loads: inrush current (bulbs), flyback voltage (motors), and precise current detection (LEDs).
Trend 4: Real-time Performance and Safety Redundancy
Cross-domain scheduling requires microsecond-level response and supports AUTOSAR Adaptive/Classic dual stacks.
Multi-core MCUs need to meet ISO 26262 ASIL-D certification, and hardware redundancy design increases costs (such as lockstep core technology).
Trend 5: Plug & Play, ZCU Modularization
Through "hardware abstraction layer" of zone controller, "one set of software adapts to all vehicle models" is realized, and the zone controller becomes a "plug-and-play" module, shortening the vehicle model development cycle to 12 months.
Infineon and Flextronics (Flex) cooperate to plan to launch a modular zone controller platform, with a series of solutions such as optimized power distribution, gateway, and motor control.
Plug & Play, a general modular assemblable and pluggable zone optimization controller, including a central processing module and pluggable modules. The central processing module includes a central processing unit, a storage unit connected to the central processing unit, and several slots. Among them, each slot with hardware identification function can identify by reading the built-in information and encryption key of the chip of the pluggable module to prevent illegal installation and access.
Trend 6: Introduction of 10BASE-T1S
10M in-vehicle Ethernet can be applied to most vehicle functional systems such as power systems, chassis systems, body systems, audio systems, and ultrasonic radars. After the technology matures, it will replace the existing vehicle CAN bus system and promote the disappearance of some edge MCUs.
OEMs are gradually forming a vehicle E/E architecture design framework of central computing + zone, continuously reducing the number of ECU controllers, reducing the weight of wiring harnesses, increasing the number of SOA atomized packages, and shortening the OTA function development cycle.
Xiaomi Auto:
The second-generation Xiaomi YU7 model promotes "central computing + zone control", with a four-in-one domain controller (central computing platform ICP), integrating VCCD, ADD, DCD, and T-Box modules, and deeply integrating computing power and communication.
Three zone controls (Z-DCU, front, left, right) realize a 75% reduction in the number of controllers, a 40% reduction in wiring harness length, an 18% reduction in weight, a 57% reduction in space occupancy, an increase of 16km in battery life, OTA during driving through memory partitioning, upgrade time <30 minutes, and 100% service interface compatibility.
XPeng Motors:
The XEEA3.5 architecture promotes "central computing + zone control", and the cockpit-driving integrated computing center XCCP realizes the integration of C-DCU and XPU, including intelligent driving, cockpit, instrument, gateway, IMU, power amplifier, etc.
Two zone controllers (left and right) realize a 50% reduction in hardware quantity and a 30% reduction in wiring harness weight. Based on the SOME/IP protocol, more than 300 atomized services (such as door control, air conditioning adjustment) are encapsulated. SOA serviceization shortens the function development cycle to one month.
Innovation Direction of Body (Zone): 10BASE-T1S
10M in-vehicle Ethernet is 10Base-T1S, also known as the IEEE802.3cg standard. The standard was officially released in early 2020. It is the most important underlying standard for software-defined vehicles and Zone architecture. Its mission is to eliminate the old CAN/LIN bus and also eliminate edge MCUs.
After three or four years of development, the ecological environment of 10M in-vehicle Ethernet has finally matured, enabling the realization of true Zone architecture controllers and software-defined vehicles. The hardware ecological environment mainly includes the physical layer, MCUs, and Ethernet switches, and the software mainly includes small RTOS and virtual machines, as well as the maturity of 10M in-vehicle Ethernet testing and evaluation platforms and native cloud development platforms.
In terms of MCUs, mainstream MCU vendors include NXP, Infineon, Renesas, STMicroelectronics, Texas Instruments, and Microchip. NXP and Texas Instruments have the highest degree of support. The S32K5 released by NXP in March 2025 not only has a built-in 10Base-T1S physical layer but also a built-in Ethernet switch. GreenHills has developed an ASIL-D level RTOS, μ-veloSity, and a μ-Visor virtual machine for the S32K5, and Texas Instruments' AN263P4 is also the same.
In terms of the physical layer, there are currently TJA1410 just released by NXP, LAN8670/1/2 of Microchip, AD3300/01/04/05 and ADIN1100 of ADI, NCN26000 and T2500 of ON Semiconductor, DP83TD510E of Texas Instruments, and CT25203 of a small company Canova.
In terms of switches, mainstream switch manufacturers have fully supported 10Base-T1S since 2021, including Marvell, Realtek, and Broadcom.
10M in-vehicle Ethernet can be applied to most vehicle functional systems such as power systems, chassis systems, body systems, audio systems, and ultrasonic radars. After the technology matures, it will replace the existing vehicle CAN bus system and promote the disappearance of some edge MCUs.
ON Semiconductor's MCU-less solution: Directly connect the domain controller to the reconfigurable control processor RCP chip, and use 10M Ethernet to replace the traditional CAN bus, realizing a flat architecture of "domain controller - 10Base-T1S Ethernet - RCP chip - LED driver". This design first achieves significant optimization at the hardware level: eliminating components such as MCUs, reset circuits, and crystals of a single node. In the 10M in-vehicle Ethernet with a length of up to 25 meters (unshielded twisted pair), up to 8 to 40 nodes can be connected. With PoDL technology, power supply and communication are completed through two wires, reducing the wiring harness cost by more than 50%, and the system complexity is greatly reduced.
In terms of performance improvement, the 10Base-T1S Ethernet has a speed of 10Mbps, which far exceeds the transmission capabilities of high-speed CAN and CAN FD, laying a foundation for high-frequency data interaction. More importantly, the RCP chip integrates gPTP protocol parsing function, which can achieve clock synchronization with nanosecond-level precision, ensuring the coordinated control of the entire vehicle lighting system under complex working conditions.
BMW's MCU-less interior lighting solution: ADI will cooperate with BMW Group and take the lead in adopting ADI's 10BASE-T1S E2B (Ethernet-Edge Bus) technology in automotive industry. BMW Group will be among the first OEMs to apply ADI's E2B technology, which will be used in BMW's future intelligent cockpit ambient lighting systems.
From ADI's 10M in-vehicle Ethernet application cases, 10Base-T1S is mainly targeted at sensors and actuators. In the sensor field, it mainly includes ultrasonic sensors, radars, and MEMS microphones, including hands-free, E-Call, and voice recognition inputs for front and rear rows. In the power transmission field, it includes position, speed, pressure, temperature, acceleration, and Hall sensors. The actuator part includes lighting, such as front headlights, rear taillights, brake lights, turn signals, interior lighting, and rearview mirror LED displays. It also includes various speakers such as door speakers, subwoofers, low-speed reminder sounds for electric vehicles. It also includes various motors such as window motors, rearview mirror motors, wiper motors, and water pump motors.
In the future, body, seat, and lighting systems will be the first to adopt 10BASE-T1S, with BMW and emerging Chinese automakers taking the lead.
Innovation Direction of Body (Zone): Deep Integration of Chassis/Powertrain Functions
Currently, the mainstream zone controller chassis/powertrain function integration solution is central computing platform + zone controller (mainly body functions) + independent chassis/powertrain domain controller. Chassis and powertrain control are still handled by dedicated domain controllers, and the zone controller only provides local power distribution and data forwarding.
With the increasing degree of integration, chassis and powertrain functions will be split and integrated into the ZCU of physical zone nearby to achieve deep hardware integration. High-level chassis control is completed by the central computing unit or an independent chassis domain controller, and the ZCU is responsible for local execution and signal processing.
In terms of chassis/powertrain control, the core tasks of ZCU include:
Signal Acquisition: Real-time acquisition of sensor data such as wheel speed, steering angle, and suspension displacement.
Instruction Execution: Receive central instructions and drive actuators (such as CDC solenoid valves, air suspension motors).
Power Distribution Management: Dynamically allocate power supply to chassis actuators (such as brake pumps, steering motors) through e-Fuse intelligent fusing.
Tesla ZCU Integrated Chassis/Powertrain Design: Tesla Cybertruck divides the body into multiple physical zones such as the center, front left, front right, and rear. Each zone deploys a Zone Controller, which is responsible for the sensors, actuators, power distribution, and communication management in that zone (such as doors, lights, seats, environmental perception sensors, etc.).
The traditional control logic divided by functional domains (such as powertrain domain, body domain) is partially decoupled. The zone controller undertakes local I/O processing, while high-level decision-making (such as autonomous driving, energy distribution) is still centrally processed by the central computing unit (CCU/HW4.0), forming a hybrid architecture of central decision-making + zone execution.
GAC ZCU Integrated Chassis/Powertrain Design: GAC Hyper GT adopts Continental's cross-domain vehicle control high-performance computing unit Body HPC2.0 (Body HPC), which integrates body control (vehicle entry, door and window control, etc.) + gateway functions (such as access to internal/external lighting, management and diagnostic functions for wireless software updates) + cross-domain vehicle control (such as thermal management, torque management, damping control, adaptive air suspension, chassis tuning, internal combustion engine fuel consumption algorithms based on machine learning and edge computing, etc.).
In addition, the four zone controllers of GAC Hyper GT are responsible for integrating chassis actuators nearby according to physical locations, as well as the power supply of nearby controllers, sensor data acquisition, and control of simple actuators. For example, the rear zone controller integrates functions such as brake-by-wire (EMB), rear-wheel steering (RWS), and active suspension (CDC/air spring) control.
UAES USP 2.0 Platform Goes Deep into the Chassis/Powertrain Field: UAES USP 2.0 is a "central computing + zoning + SOA" solution based on cross-domain integration. Through a zonal architecture, it can integrate nearly 20 independent ECUs, with 951 basic functions, 126 atomic services, and 105 basic services. It can provide 1100+ vehicle APIs, 65 OTA APIs, and 55 AI operators. These APIs and operators can help developers easily implement cross-domain application scenarios of vehicles. Currently, the services that can be called have gone deep into the fields of body control, energy management, motion control, thermal management, etc.