- American Society of Anesthesiologists?
- American Standards Association?
- Acetylsalicylic acid?
- American Statistical Association?
There are many more, 1200 meanings, according to allacroynms.com. However, in this case, ASA stands for Automotive SerDes Alliance and is, for accuracy purposes, followed by Motion Link.
What is ASA Motion Link?
ASA Motion Link is an application-specific communication link that supports the asymmetry of typical display, camera, and sensor applications. Serializers and De-serializers, or SerDes for short, are common in many high-speed digital bus technologies. These links take various digital inputs and send them over a distance using high-speed serial links. The asymmetrical element of SerDes means that one direction goes faster than the other, offering savings in power consumption and keeping transceiver complexity to a minimum. Using a high-speed downlink for data transport, for example, from a camera to the central CPU, and then a lower-speed uplink that supports less-demanding requirements like device monitoring and control.
As a car becomes an increasingly more complex platform to run business and infotainment apps, stream videos, and even offer routines based on learning user habits, it must simultaneously process the gigabytes of sensor input and navigate traffic safely. An asymmetrical link is well suited to remote sensors in the vehicle, which require high-speed outputs but need to limit implementation complexity, power requirements, and cost.
Why have a standard?
Some factors considered when selecting an in-vehicle network include weight, the number of sensors, power consumption, cost, availability of parts over the production lifetime of the vehicle, technology complexity, and interoperability. Closed proprietary communications links can be prohibitive of this vision, and a selection based on a supply chain where sensors and ECUs can be purchased from different vendors, ensuring they will link up and function as expected, will be of benefit. The Compliance Test Specification is a primary contribution of standardized interfaces and is often written and validated through a collaborative process involving many different companies. Interoperability is achieved when each vendor can implement standardized communications links that have been tested using approved methods of implementation (MOI). The advent of standardized in-vehicle communication links like Automotive SerDes Alliance makes this vision possible. Standardized technology expands the market and creates competition for chipset and module development, thereby driving down costs and enabling a more diverse supply chain for OEMs.
Keysight and VSI have recently signed a Memorandum of Understanding for ASA Motion Link technology and test methodology development. You can read more about that here.