BlackBerry and Jaguar Land Rover are likely to collaborate and develop electric car software.">

BlackBerry Limited and Jaguar Land Rover have announced that they have entered into a multi-year agreement to collaborate and develop technology for the India-based automotive manufacturer’s next-generation vehicles.

As part of the agreement, BlackBerry will license its QNX and Certicom technology to Tata’s Jaguar Land Rover, as well as assign a team of engineers to support in the development of new Electronic Control Unit (ECU) modules. The first ECU project will be a next-generation infotainment system.

The deal is the latest in the former Canadian phone maker’s pipeline as it seeks to expand its QNX car software unit from in-car entertainment systems to other realms of auto software, including self-driving technology. Albeit software development for the automobile industry is comparatively a small part of BlackBerry’s business, it’s becoming an important growth area.

“Working with BlackBerry will enable us to develop the safe and secure next-generation connected car our customers want,” said Dave Nesbitt, Vehicle Engineering Director at Jaguar Land Rover. “Together with BlackBerry engineers, we will be able to access the most dynamic and up-to-date software to ensure the highest security required for our connected vehicles.”

Albeit software development for the automobile industry is comparatively a small part of BlackBerry’s business, it’s becoming an important growth area. The company was commended for its recent automotive design wins with Baidu, Delphi, Denso, NVIDIA, Qualcomm, Visteon, and others.

The Ontario-based software maker currently provides OEMs around the world with state-of-the-art technology to protect and mitigate hardware, software, applications and end-to-end systems from cyberattacks.