Senthil Vel Kumaran — Embedded Systems Engineer II

Who I Am.

I'm an Embedded Software Engineer II at Visteon Corporation, building safety-critical firmware for automotive cockpit ECUs that ship in Mahindra and Tata Motors production vehicles. My code runs in real cars on Indian roads every day.

I fell in love with embedded systems because it's the only place where software directly controls physical hardware — where every bit flip has a real-world consequence. From a Braille education toy at VIT to production firmware shown at CES 2026 in Las Vegas, this is the work I was built for.

VIT Chennai · B.Tech ECE · 8.53 CGPA · 2023

Visteon Corporation · Tier-1 Automotive Supplier · Jul 2023–Present

3 production ECU programs · Mahindra + Tata Motors

CES 2026 · Las Vegas Global Showcase

0 Production ECU Programs

0+ Years at Visteon

ASIL-D ISO 26262 Safety Level

CES '26 Global Showcase · Las Vegas

Work History

Where I've built things.

Tier-1 automotive supplier · Shipped firmware · Global OEM programs

Jul 2023 — Present

Visteon Corp.

Embedded SW Engineer II Current

Jan 2023 — Jun 2023

Visteon Corp.

SW Developer Intern Internship

3 ECUs

Production programs shipped to Mahindra & Tata Motors

ASIL-D

Highest ISO 26262 safety integrity level in production

Silver Award

Diagnostic stack delivered ahead of program gate

🔌

Full UDS Diagnostic Stack — Sole Module Owner

Owned DCM and DEM modules end-to-end across two production programs. Implemented 13 ISO 14229 service handlers: session control (0x10), security access (0x27), DTC read/clear (0x19/0x14), routine control (0x31), data I/O (0x22/0x2E). Validated against OEM diagnostic test specs.

🚌

AUTOSAR CAN Stack — 200+ Signal Vehicle Network

Sole owner of AUTOSAR CAN stack (MCAL → CanIf → PduR → COM). Configured 200+ PDU vehicle communication matrix via DBC/ARXML signal mapping. Supported both Classic CAN and CAN FD on two production ECUs.

🌐

Automotive Ethernet — Clause 22 MDIO Driver from Scratch

Wrote Clause 22 MDIO driver for Realtek PHY: register-map init, auto-negotiation sequencing, link-status polling. Configured NXP SJA1105 L2 switch forwarding tables and VLAN assignments via SPI. Completed 100BASE-T1 bring-up ahead of hardware integration milestone.

📱

Qualcomm Snapdragon 8155 SoC Integration

Designed custom UART IPC framing protocol between Renesas RH850 MCU and Qualcomm Snapdragon 8155 SoC: byte-level packetization, CRC validation, sequence-number retransmission. Delivers live vehicle CAN signals into QNX Neutrino RTOS and Android Automotive HAL.

🛡️

ISO 26262 ASIL-D Safety Firmware — Zero Field Escapes

Thermal safety monitor on NXP MPC560xP: I²C ADC polling, multi-threshold hysteresis (warn/derate/shutdown), PWM backlight attenuation. Zero thermal-related field escapes across full OEM validation. Also reduced ECU quiescent current 20–40% via peripheral clock gating and EcuM sleep optimization.

Ahead

Display bring-up completed ahead of schedule, unblocking team

3 Repos

Audited 3 production codebases for MISRA-C compliance

GMSL2

Triple 12.5-inch cockpit display SerDes bring-up

🖥️

Triple 12.5-inch Display Subsystem Bring-Up

Led display bring-up on Infineon Traveo II: configured Maxim MAX96705/MAX9272 GMSL2 SerDes chain, I²C deserializer register init, pixel clock synchronization, forward channel link training. Completed ahead of schedule, unblocking downstream software integration team.

🔧

Driver Development & Static Analysis

Developed and validated SPI and UART peripheral drivers at register level. Traced execution flows using Lauterbach Trace32. Decoded live CAN frame timing with Vector CANalyzer and CANoe. Audited 3 production codebases with KlocWork and Coverity — cleared full MISRA-C backlog before first hardware-in-loop test.

Projects

What I've shipped.

Click any project to explore the architecture, tech decisions, and full details.

Tata Motors★ CES 2026

Triple 12.5-inch Cockpit HPC Controller

Infineon Traveo II · ARM Cortex-M7 · Team of 7

High-performance cockpit ECU driving three simultaneous digital displays, showcased at CES 2026, Las Vegas.

Infineon Traveo IIAUTOSAR100BASE-T1CAN FDMDIOSPI

Click to explore architecture

Mahindra

Dual 10.25-inch Cockpit Domain Controller

Renesas RH850 · Snapdragon 8155 · QNX · Team of 6

Cockpit domain controller with Qualcomm Snapdragon SoC integration and complete UDS diagnostic stack.

Renesas RH850Snapdragon 8155QNXISO 14229DCM/DEM

Click to explore architecture

Mahindra · Fuel + EV

10.25-inch Standalone Infotainment ECU

NXP MPC560xP · ISO 26262 ASIL-D · Team of 5

ASIL-D thermal safety monitor with zero field escapes across full OEM validation cycle.

NXP MPC560xPASIL-DI²C ADCPWMGMSL2

Click to explore architecture

Team Lead · 4 members

Braille Education Toy

Arduino Mega 2560 · Audio Playback · Accessibility

Interactive Braille learning device — 26 push buttons, WAV audio playback per button press.

Arduino Mega 2560Digital I/OmicroSDLM386WAV

Click to explore

Embedded Dev · 4 members

RFID Smart Attendance System

ATmega328P · SPI · Cloud Integration

RFID attendance system with real-time Google Sheets sync via REST API.

ATmega328PMFRC522SPIWi-FiGoogle API

Click to explore

Project 01 · LCD Display

LCD Display

Raspberry Pi Pico · HD44780 · 4-bit Parallel · C (C11)

HD44780 16×2 LCD driver written from scratch — 4-bit parallel protocol, nibble splitting, EN pulse generation, DDRAM cursor addressing. Zero external libraries.

HD447804-bit ModeGPIOPico SDKCMake

Visit Project Site ↗

Project 02 · Interrupts

Interrupt Handling

Raspberry Pi Pico · GPIO IRQ · Rising Edge · ISR

External interrupt on GPIO rising edge — ISR callback pattern, hardware edge detection, LED toggle. Explains polling vs interrupt-driven design.

GPIO IRQRising EdgeISRPico SDK

Visit Project Site ↗

Project 03 · Ultrasonic

Ultrasonic Distance Sensor

Raspberry Pi Pico · HC-SR04 · Time-of-Flight · C

HC-SR04 distance measurement — 10µs trigger pulse, echo width timing, distance = width ÷ 29 ÷ 2. Timeout guard, PuTTY serial output.

HC-SR04Time-of-FlightGPIO TimingSerial

Visit Project Site ↗

Project 04 · Keypad

Keypad Matrix Scanning

Raspberry Pi Pico · 4×4 Matrix · Column Scan · C

4×4 matrix column scanning — 16 keys on 8 GPIO pins, pull-up inputs, key debounce, 2D keyMap[row][col] lookup table.

Matrix ScanPull-upDebounceGPIO

Visit Project Site ↗

Project 05 · ADC + PWM

ADC + PWM LED Control

Raspberry Pi Pico · 12-bit ADC · Software PWM · C

Potentiometer → 12-bit ADC → software PWM → LED brightness control — voltage conversion math, duty cycle concept, real-time serial voltage output.

12-bit ADCPWMAnalogSerial

Visit Project Site ↗

Recognition

Awards & Credentials.

🥈

Visteon Silver Award

Recognised for delivering the complete DCM & DEM diagnostic stack ahead of program gate, enabling on-time OEM sign-off for Mahindra and Tata Motors programs. This was the first time in the program a diagnostic stack was completed this early.

🏆

Top Performer — C Embedded Training

Ranked #1 in the C Embedded Language Training cohort conducted by Yashwant Kanetkar in partnership with Visteon Corporation. Selected for fast-track production assignment ahead of schedule.

🌍

CES 2026 — Las Vegas

Contributed firmware to Visteon's cockpit ECU products demonstrated at Consumer Electronics Show 2026, Las Vegas. Triple-screen and pillar-to-pillar cockpit display systems showcased to global OEM executives and automotive press.

📜

Certifications

Modeling of Semiconductor-Based Junction Devices — VIT Chennai

AI Technologies — IIT Bombay Spoken Tutorial Project

Advanced C++ Training — Visteon Corporation

Technical Writing

Embedded Insights.

Deep-dives into automotive embedded systems — protocols, architecture, real-world ECU development. See README.md for how to add posts.

Coming Soon

—

How CAN Bus Works — A Firmware Engineer's Perspective

Frame structure, arbitration, bit-stuffing, AUTOSAR signal mapping to PDUs.

Coming Soon

—

I²C Deep Dive — Register Maps to Production Driver Code

START/STOP, ACK, address phases, and writing real I²C drivers for automotive sensors.

Coming Soon

—

AUTOSAR DCM — How UDS Diagnostics Actually Work

Service IDs, session layers, security access, implementing ISO 14229 in AUTOSAR Classic.

Coming Soon

—

ISO 26262 in Practice — What ASIL-D Means in Code

Safety patterns, failure modes, safe states, thermal protection firmware.

Coming Soon

—

QNX & Android Automotive — IPC from MCU to SoC

How bare-metal MCU data travels to Android display through QNX Neutrino.

Coming Soon

—

Automotive Ethernet — Why 100BASE-T1 is Different

Single-pair Ethernet, MDIO registers, PHY bring-up, switch config.

Senthil Vel
Kumaran.

Who I Am.

Where I've built things.

What I've shipped.

TECH STACK

Awards & Credentials.

Embedded Insights.

Ask about me.

Get in touch.

Senthil Vel Kumaran.

Who I Am.

Where I've built things.

What I've shipped.

TECH STACK

Awards & Credentials.

Embedded Insights.

Ask about me.

Get in touch.

Senthil Vel
Kumaran.