The jointly driven research and development project is initially scheduled to run for three years. The project kick-off took place in 2024 at Fraunhofer IESE in Kaiserslautern. Key milestones and future goals of the collaboration were discussed during a technical workshop at Perseus' new research center in Daegu, South Korea.

“Korea has been on our radar for some time, and Perseus has proven to be not only our entry point into Korea, but also a trusted long-term partner in this important market for the automotive industry. The company's technical expertise, product quality, and commitment to innovation are outstanding,” said Dr. Pablo Oliveira Antonino, department head at Fraunhofer IESE.

This collaboration and the combined use of Fraunhofer FERAL and PERSEUS' hypervisor called PEGASUS will enable the following:

• The creation of digital twins and virtual test benches in which the execution of mixed runtime environments virtualized by PEGASUS is systematically investigated—including safety-critical and non-safety-critical functions—in order to test behavior in the event of errors, failures, or unexpected inputs.
• Use of co-simulation and integrative coupling of simulators, models, and virtual hardware using FERAL to simulate not only the behavior of operating systems/VMs based on PEGASUS, but also networks, bus systems, sensors, and the environment, among other things. This enables realistic end-to-end investigation of continuous test scenarios.
• Analysis of performance, robustness, latency, resource conflicts, fault propagation, and other quality attributes in safety-critical contexts (e.g., automotive/software-defined vehicle).
• Support for continuous engineering and continuous integration for embedded and safety-critical software by enabling frequent virtual testing early in development. This reduces the need for costly hardware prototypes (HiL) and allows errors to be detected earlier.
• Thanks to its special capabilities in the virtual validation of hypervisor-based architectures, FERAL is particularly well suited to comprehensively investigate and evaluate the performance and reliability of the PEGASUS hypervisor.

“With Fraunhofer's virtualization and verification expertise, Perseus will demonstrate the future-proof nature of our technologies,” explained Dr. Sang-bum Suh, CEO of Perseus. “Our hypervisor enables the secure execution of critical and non-critical applications on shared hardware – a key technology in the SDV era.”

One of the project's goals is to reduce certification times for safety-critical systems from the current 18 months to as little as six months. In addition, the combination of international research expertise and industry-oriented development creates an environment for mutual learning and technological synergies.

“This partnership creates a platform for mutual learning by combining Perseus’ expertise in hypervisor development with our competence in virtual engineering and system-level validation,” Antonino continued.

Another expression of confidence in the partnership is the appointment of Dr. Sang-bum Suh to the Industry Advisory Board of the Virtual Engineering department at Fraunhofer IESE. This close connection underscores the long-term commitment of both organizations and their shared goal of setting new international standards for safe, flexible, and future-proof vehicle architectures.

About Fraunhofer IESE
The Fraunhofer Institute for Experimental Software Engineering IESE in Kaiserslautern is a leading international research institute for applied software and system development. With technologies such as Fraunhofer FERAL, IESE makes a significant contribution to the digital transformation of safety-critical systems.

About Perseus Co., Ltd.
Perseus is a company specializing in hypervisor and virtualization technologies based in Daegu, Korea. With its Pegasus product, the company offers one of the most technically advanced and secure hypervisor solutions for the automotive industry.