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Upcoming stringent regulations on emissions and fuel efficiency are driving the automotive industry towards lightweight vehicle design. Thus, a higher share of carbon fiber composite materials in vehicle structures is expected. Current literature addresses development processes of composite components under a limited scope, however the considerations of design parameters used in these studies are inadequate for the realistic development of a full vehicle structure, especially in a resource-constrained development project. In addition, existing vehicle structure design philosophies applied for metal structures cannot be directly ported over for composite design due to differences in material properties, failure modes and design for manufacturing limitations.