GMV has obtained capability level 3 (CL-3) of Automotive SPICE, a specific assessment scheme for automotive software processes.

This achievement vouches for the continuous improvement of GMV’s inhouse automotive software development processes, which had already reached level 3 in several of the processes back in July 2018. In November 2019 it duly achieved this level for all processes within the scope of VDA QMC.

ISO/IEC 15504, known as the Software Process Improvement Capability dEtermination (SPICE) standard, and its subsequent upgrading into the ISO/IEC 33000 family of standards, is a model for assessment of development processes and maintenance of information systems and software products. Automotive SPICE® is an initiative of the Automotive Special Interest Group and Quality Management Center of the German association of the automotive industry (VDA QMC). It is a specific automotive software-processes assessment scheme created by a group of top automotive manufacturers. It has by now become a de facto automotive standard, used widely for assessment of software suppliers in this sector.

Automotive SPICE® has two dimensions: process assessment and process capability assessment. Processes are based on ISO 12207, which has been extended and tweaked to bring it into line with specific automotive requirements. Capability is broken down into 6 levels (from 0 to 5) as defined in ISO15504: Level 0: Incomplete process, Level 1: Performed process, Level 2: Managed process, Level 3: Established process, Level 4: Predictable process and Level 5: Optimizing process. For each level there are standard process attributes for assessing the capability levels. Although the Automotive SPICE model establishes these 6 levels, level 3 is the top level considered in practice.

The processes assessed (VDA) comprise management processes (MAN), software- and system-engineering processes (SYS/SWE) and support processes (SUP).

This achievement represents a new milestone in the quality management system of GMV’s intelligent transportation systems sector, which has also been successfully assessed this year at CMMI Level 5.

It also provides a series of benefits in development process management and guarantees total alignment with the requirements laid down for the automotive sector’s software providers.