Autoliv's Products Development System (APDS) is a systematic procedure for detecting any weaknesses as early as possible in a potential new product. In this way, we insure the developed projects are marketable.

Ideas for new projects mainly come from our own research and development. With 4,100 people in R, D&E and 20 crash tracks in 12 countries, we have more technical resources in automotive safety than any other company.

Hundreds of new vehicles are tested in crashes every year. We perform several thousand sled tests and do tens of thousands of crash simulations on computers. All of these tests give us unique insight into the way vehicles and car occupants behave during crashes.

Our research is also conducted in consultation with the vehicle manufacturers and the Autoliv Technical Advisory Board, which consists of four world-leading professors in safety and biodynamics from Japan, Sweden, the U.K. and the U.S.

In addition, we research accident databases to select the projects that have the best return/risk ratio. In addition, the whole concept is explored in a feasibility study before a possible development project is allowed to be started.

After this pre-APDS study, prototypes may be produced and tested. The final control in this phase is called Tollgate 1. Provided that the project passes this checkpoint, the prototypes are further validated until the product design can be frozen and finally approved in Tollgate 2. This makes it possible to order tools and assembly lines and to manufacture qualification samples. If the samples pass Tollgate 3, several full-speed production runs will be performed. This will verify the stability of the manufacturing process, and this is the last and definitive Tollgate.

To further reduce Autoliv’s financial risk it is our policy to try to get a customer, i.e. a vehicle manufacturer, involved in a project as early as possible.