Depending on the physical structuring of large distributed safety-critical real-timesystems, one can distinguish federated and integrated system architectures. The DECOS architecture combines the complexity management advantages of federated systems with the functional integration and hardware benefits of an integrated approach. This paper investigates the benefits of the DECOS integrated system architecture as an electronic infrastructure for future car generations. The shift to an integrated architecture will result in quantifiable cost reductions in the areas of system hardware cost and system development. In the paper we present a current federated Fiat car E/E architecture and discuss a possible-mapping to an integrated solution based on the DECOS architecture. The proposed architecture provides a foundation for mixed-criticality integration with both safety-critical and non safety-critical subsystems. In particular, this architecture supports applications up to the highest criticality classes (10^{-9} failures per hour), thereby taking into account the emerging dependability requirements of by-wire functionality in the automotive industry.