Autonomous trucking is rapidly emerging as a transformative solution to relieve the growing pressure on supply chains. This pressure stems from persistent challenges such as labor shortages, rising logistics costs and demand for uninterrupted operations.
Kodiak is helping lead this shift, combining real-world operational experience, advanced AI-powered software and modular hardware designed for real-world deployment, supported by NXP’s automotive-grade technologies. Together, Kodiak and NXP are advancing toward a scalable, safety-critical computing platform that is purpose built to support the future of driverless trucks.
Autonomous trucking is changing the mobility ecosystem with the potential to make commercial transportation more efficient, sustainable and affordable. Major OEMs and fleet owners are exploring autonomous truck deployment to help solve driver shortages and efficiency issues. Autonomous truck deployment also supports 24/7 freight movement, making it a partial solution for modern logistics challenges. The transportation industry is moving toward fully autonomous solutions, but it must meet stringent safety and reliability requirements to enable true driverless operations.
Kodiak Robotics, Inc. (“Kodiak”), a leading provider of AI-powered autonomous vehicle ground transportation, takes an ecosystem-based approach to building its technology. Kodiak integrates advanced components from across the automotive and technology sectors. As part of this strategy, Kodiak incorporated NXP’s high-performance computing, extensive in-vehicle communication interfaces and ISO 26262-compliant solutions. NXP solutions help enable real-time vehicle control and rigorous functional safety across the Kodiak Driver.
Kodiak Driver is a virtual driver that combines advanced AI-powered software with modular and vehicle-agnostic hardware.
The Kodiak Driver requires an automotive-grade, safety-compliant processing platform that can deliver high computational performance, functional safety and long-term scalability. Kodiak believes these requirements are essential for achieving full autonomous trucking.
Seeking reliability, safety and efficiency at every turn, Kodiak demanded technologies that deliver real-time performance, meet high functional safety standards and support broad vehicle subsystem integration (CAN, Ethernet, I2C, SPI, UART).
NXP’s automotive-grade, safety-compliant solutions met Kodiak’s demanding requirements for performance, reliability and safety. This combination further enables scalable, real-world deployment of autonomous trucks.
Introducing ISO 26262 functional safety up to ASIL D, NXP's S32G3 Processors for Vehicle Networking and S32K3 Microcontrollers for Automotive Applications help Kodiak's engineers support Kodiak’s functional safety objectives while offering system flexibility. The S32G3 and S32K3’s safety-rated real-time and application cores offer ASIL D compliance, enabling fail-operational safety features, redundancy and fault tolerance in critical control systems. The S32G3’s compute performance, network accelerators, extensive peripherals and flexibility of interfaces allow Kodiak to support complex mixed-criticality use cases.
The S32G family supports the needs of new vehicle architectures: service-oriented gateways, domain controllers, zonal processors, safety processors and more. Explore S32G Vehicle Network Processors.
NXP's VR5510 multi-channel high-voltage PMIC combined with PF53 is designed for the S32G family and provides integrated and independent voltage monitoring circuits and ASIL D compliance. NXP's processors deliver deterministic, real-time performance that is critical for the Kodiak Driver’s precision control over steering, braking and power management.
Integrated CAN, Ethernet/TSN, and fault-tolerant network interfaces promote seamless interoperability across Kodiak's technology platform, helping reduce complexity and improve subsystem integration.
NXP products help shape the compute architecture that powers the Kodiak Driver, enabling it to execute complex, safety-critical tasks at scale within autonomous semi-truck subsystems. These tasks include:
Additionally, NXP provided Kodiak with pre-production samples, reference designs and technical support to accelerate development timelines. To ensure software compatibility with Kodiak's existing stack, NXP also granted access to technical documentation, SDKs and development tools (including third-party system-on-modules (SOMs)) for early evaluation). Dedicated technical support helped Kodiak engineers to navigate key challenges in hardware-software integration and safety case validation. NXP’s mature and well-integrated software suite enabled Kodiak to focus on the application layer from the outset. Notably, ready-to-use drivers for the S32G’s networking accelerators, such as LLCE and PFE, facilitated early communication with critical automotive interfaces.
This close collaboration also enhanced Kodiak’s supply chain resilience and helped to ensure hardware availability across its autonomous trucking and public sector deployments.
With NXP's high-reliability processing at its core, Kodiak has successfully deployed the first publicly announced customer-owned and -operated driverless semi-trucks, delivering freight autonomously on real-world routes.
Kodiak is now moving forward in advancing its fully autonomous trucking capabilities for driverless over-the-road trucking at scale.
NXP’s technology enables Kodiak to create a unified hardware platform for the Kodiak Driver, supporting multiple distinct vehicle platforms without requiring hardware redesigns—demonstrating modularity, scalability and operational readiness.
Through its collaboration with NXP, Kodiak has reinforced its commitment to safety, reliability and scalability, helping to solidify its role in autonomous trucking innovation.
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