Volvo’s overall sales may be down, but it aims to capitalize on the growing demand for EV and hybrid cars by embedding Nvidia-powered software and “megacastings” - massive presses to make large single-piece aluminum vehicle underbodies - to cut costs for electric cars.

The Nvidia collaboration announcement came ahead of Volvo’s Capital Markets presentation in Gothenburg. Volvo said it intends to develop a single "technology stack" for all car models – starting with its flagship EX90.

The EX90's software system is backed by Nvidia's DRIVE Orin system-on-a-chip, which is capable of over 250 trillion operations per second (TOPS) and will be replaced later this decade by a chip capable of 1,000 trillion TOPS, Volvo said noting the system will enable its engineers to build better safety systems for cars.

Learnings from the EX90 will help Volvo build the 2025 ES90 electric sedan, Chief Product and Strategy Officer Erik Severinson said. The company plans to reveal the next evolution of its electric sedan in March 2025. "It will be for global audiences, including the EU, U.S. and Asia. But China may be its biggest market,” Severinson said.

A new rival to Tesla

The most ambitious part of Volvo’s strategy involving the Volvo flagship EX90 and the ES90 is to develop a new rival to the Tesla Model Y. The EX60 will be based on the next-generation SPA3 platform and feature Tesla-like mega castings plus Volvo's most advanced software.

Volvo will follow up the EX60 with three more unnamed EVs, all built on a similar electrical architecture and software.

“The EX60 will be the next key volume driver for Volvo Cars. It will be the first car to be based on the SPA3 architecture, made in Gothenburg for global markets,” Severinson said. “Three more cars remain in active development and all five will feature our Superset tech stack."

Part of Volvo’s extended partnership with Nvidia will include the Swedish automaker embedding Drive Thor SoC in its future models, enabling future cars to perform a whopping 1,000 trillion operations per second.

“By 2025, 50-60% of all global sales will be electrified. By 2030, we aim to be 90-100% electrified,” CEO Jim Rowan told Reuters. "We have seen that this transition is going to take a little bit longer than we had first thought when we first made those targets."

The company isn't racing against time to develop AI-based software but indicated it was doing it to achieve its goal of "zero collisions."

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