You’d be essentially starting at zero, but that’s ok. If you break in, you’ll probably need to move to a less glamorous area and accept lower pay. And you’ll always be lower than people with engineering degrees in the corporate prestige hierarchy. If you’re ok with that, go for it!

Check out ROS. No, it’s not what they use, but it’s free and available and absolutely gives you a good idea of the kinds of workflows you will see. When I worked in the industry, all physical hardware was plugged into massive simulation setups and run over and over and over again. Multiple hardware revisions, multiple software revisions. All before they would try putting it into an actual prototype vehicle. ROS lets you do all that - simulations plus interfacing with actual robotic equipment.

Good luck

One simple way that might work is start hacking. Because it is a vast vast market with very diverse bespoke problems, there is a huge potential for small "bicycle-size" [1] improvements.

Sure it is not lead software engineer for Ferrari. But because people hire people they know, doing is your best route for meeting people. And when people hire engineers, they also consider their engineering wherewithal. Finally, if hacking automotive solutions does not appeal to you, that may be a sign that current job escape is more motivating than the specific career switch.

[1] bicycle-size problems are problems an engineer can solve working alone from Andrew Ritchie https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andrew_Ritchie_(Brompton_found...