Car makers are using AI to speed up how new cars are designed

In short: Car companies are starting to use AI tools to shorten parts of the long process of designing and testing new vehicles.

What's going on

Car makers often take five years or more to bring a new vehicle from idea to production. That is a long time for customer tastes, gas prices, and rules to change. A new episode of The Vergecast looks at why car companies want AI to help move faster.

On the show, journalist Tim Stevens describes car companies using AI in areas like early design work, model making, and wind tunnel testing. A wind tunnel is a large room where engineers blow air at a car to see how it handles drag, like testing how a bicycle feels when you ride into strong wind. The idea is that AI can generate more design options quickly and help engineers narrow down which ones are worth building and testing.

The episode also raises a concern about jobs. Car companies often say they are not trying to replace people with AI. But the show notes that even small changes in the workflow can reduce how many human specialists are needed, especially in the early steps of design.

What to watch

If AI helps companies move faster, you could see car designs change more often, similar to how phone models refresh every year. Regulators and safety testers may also need to adapt, since faster design cycles can mean more new variations to review. And even if AI is mainly used as a helper tool, the pressure to cut costs could still reshape who gets hired, who gets trained, and which skills stay valuable.

Source: The Verge AI