Pandora is aiming to reach “on-the-road” consumers with targeted audio advertising. It has reportedly been working on an improved car radio console that would help with its presence in connected cars. The Internet-based music streaming service itself will be installed in one-third of all new cars shipped this year, so it makes sense for them to try and get a jump-start.
Tag: connected car
On-demand Cars’ Huge Impact On Taxi Business
The taxi business is being impacted severely by competing transportation networks: in July, average trips by taxis in San Francisco, home to on-demand car services Uber and Lyft, were reportedly only one-third of trips in March 2012. The San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency (SFMTA) is doing its best to help taxi drivers stay in business, but the trend towards on-demand services seems all but inevitable at this point.
The Trigger + Jamyn Edis – Dash
Driving a modern car remains a strangely analog experience. For all its digital wizardry beneath the hood, your car hardly gives you any feedback or data on your driving habits. You could be a great driver or a terrible one, and you’d have no way of knowing it – other than vaguely subjective feedback from your co-passengers.
This is where Dash steps in. With its new smart device, Dash promises to bridge the “data gap” between you and your car and changes the way you think of driving.
What is Dash?
Dash is a smartphone app that collects data from your car’s computer through a connected On-Board Diagnostics (OBD) device. Once installed, it can send data about the car directly to the Dash smartphone app, where it can be collected and further analyzed.
A good way to understand Dash is to think of it as a “Fitbit for Cars.” Just as Fitbit’s health tracking device collects information about your physical activity and makes it viewable on your smartphone, Dash collects data from the car’s OBD device and crunches it to reveal useful information on your driving habits.
The Dash Score
At the heart of the Dash experience is the “Dash Score.” This is an algorithmically determined figure that scores your driving on a 100 point scale. The higher the score, the better the driving.
Dash collects over 300 data points to calculate the Dash Score. This includes data about your driving behavior (including speed, acceleration and braking), road conditions, time of day, fuel usage and car maintenance. Dash crunches this data in real time, giving you objective feedback on your driving skills as you drive. Thus, instead of a subjective scale like “good,” “okay” or “better,” you get concrete verifications of your driving skills.
However, the Dash Score is more than just an ego-inflating number. Dash is already in talks with several insurance companies to reward good drivers with discounts on their insurance. Going further, it isn’t unimaginable to foresee a future where your Dash Score becomes as indispensable as your Credit Score when getting car insurance.
More Than a Score
Although the Dash Score remains the focal point of the Dash app, its range of features goes far beyond the score alone. It includes a litany of features, such as:
• Crash detection: The app can detect crashes and automatically send out alert messages to select people on your contact list.
• Driving statistics: Like Fitbit, Dash gives you detailed statistics on your driving habits, such as miles traveled, fuel consumed, etc.
• Diagnostics: Since the Dash app hooks up to the car’s computer, it can diagnose common problems easily. For instance, if your car’s “check engine” light goes off, Dash will point out the possible source of the problem, saving you money on a mechanic.
• Repair estimates: Dash can give you fairly accurate estimations for common car repairs, again, saving you money on car mechanics.
• Deals and discounts: Besides helping you cut down on insurance costs, Dash can also show you deals on gas, food, etc. near your location as you drive.
Beyond Statistics: The “Automotive” Graph and the Internet of Things
While the above features are groundbreaking in their own right, what makes Dash particularly exciting is the “Automotive Graph.” This is an open platform built upon the massive amount of data Dash collects every day. Developers can connect to this platform through Dash’s API (called “CHASSIS API”) to create smartphone apps that utilize Dash’s driving data. Developers can also use this API to create better experiences on connected “smart” devices. Going forward, you can expect your car to “talk” to the Nest thermostat in your garage, or expect to seamlessly transfer data from your Fitbit tracker to your Dash app.
Dash points towards a near-future where the “Internet of Things” isn’t limited to narrow, esoteric functions such as fitness trackers and home thermostats, but extends to include a wide range of activities such as driving. With its smartphone apps and smart APIs, Dash is also bringing the notoriously slow-moving automotive industry into the future. Perhaps most importantly, Dash promises to make our cars a little easier to understand – and our roads a whole lot safer.
Glympse Breathes New Life Into Location Sharing
While location sharing is nothing new, startup Glympse has some key differentiators including a focus on real-time tracking and ephemeral sharing. Glympse lets you temporarily share your location w/ anyone by simply sending a link, accessible for a set period of time, from minutes to hours. The service can continually track your location if you choose to enable that feature, including traveling speed and arrival estimates. Even more interesting is their partnerships with Ford, Verizon, Gogo and more to enable sharing in-car, in-flight and anywhere else you may be traveling.
Car As Media Channel: Google Announces Android Auto
Car innovation does not keep up with the rapidity we expect from mobile or PC developments. What has largely been plaguing the auto space has been a lack of cooperation as each car manufacturer creates their proprietary technology, not to mention their 3+ year development cycles. Take Ford Sync for example, which has a custom app platform where developers can only create apps for new Ford vehicles. If that developer tries to iterate for another manufacturer, they have to start over. For real innovation to take place, their needs to be a standard operating system in the car.
Enter Android Auto, announced this week at Googe I/O which looks to power the infotainment systems across 40 car manufacturers including Honda, Hyundai, Volvo and more. Similar to Apple’s Carplay it works by plugging your phone into the car console which then displays it on the center display. Interestingly enough, the apps are all voice-controlled and glanceable to address safety concerns. The result brings more media into the car and improves utility like better navigation, location recommendations and more. The mobile component makes Android Auto current as app updates will be reflected in the car.
The Internet Of Things And Cars
The automotive industry is now a key information hub in the mobile and social data ecosystem. As cars create more behavioral data, they will become tools for predictive analyses, offer optimization, and transform themselves into a form of alternative media. That is the promise of the connected car, as connectivity will bring interactive media into the car, enhanced safety and driving services and and even autonomous driving. That was the topic of discussion at CE Week’s The Internet Of Things And Cars Panel as technologists from Telenav, GM, Intel and more took to the stage. Below are a few topics during the panel.
Convenience over Safety
The session kicked off with an interesting poll which asked what the main driver of the internet of things in the car will be. What would lead consumers to want ultimate connectivity in their cars? The poll actually saw convenience as the number one driver far outpacing safety, security, and added utility which was a bit surprising. Safety and security have to be the most important consideration within any car (it is for the connected home at least) but perhaps we believe that the internet of things will bring us convenience before anything else. Ultimately, changing the safety features of a car is far more involved, so we may just get a better suite of car-friendly apps first.
Developmental Roadblocks
Another main point of interest was the roadblocks to innovation, namely the long development cycle of most auto manufacturers. Tim Nixon, GM’s CTO of Global Connected Consumer division mentioned that most dev cycles are three years so that technology is inherently outdated by the time a car goes to market, compared with the agility of mobile innovation, for instance. One solve for this is aftermarket items like a Pioneer radio, for example, which can be installed on a 10 year old car. Another interesting consideration is the necessity to create open APIs in the car which third party developers can iterate on. This is seen with through the likes of Mojio and others who provide a data stream of your driving behavior which third parties can leverage for a breadth of products and services. Ford Sync is another example with a somewhat open app ecosystem. More significant is Apple Airplay and Google’s Automotive Alliance which will create a standard OS for in-car apps. This cooperation is unfortunately uncommon in a highly competitive industry full of proprietary technology.
Autonomous Driving
The panel concluded with a discussion of autonomous driving. These driverless cars will use car-to-car communication, connectivity and sensors to safely drive without the need for any human input. Google and every car manufacturer has been testing prototypes but we are still a ways away from this entering the consumer market. The panelists all remarked on some of the considerations to actualizing autonomous vehicles. Chief among the concerns were connectivity issues as you have a wide array of mapping and sensing technology which relies on a stable connection. GM and AT&T announced a partnership to build 4G LTE connectivity into upcoming Chevrolet vehicles with a wifi hotspot. Others will need to follow suit if we expect all of these smart car features.
When Will Leap Motion Offer a Touch Free Gesture-Reading UI for Cars?
Last year, software developers from QNX demonstrated their beta test of Leap Motion gesture control UI for the BlackBerry 10 car software. QNX announced that it intends to be the first to introduce touchless infotainment systems at the Blackberry Live 2013 conference. Those days are still few years away, but they are coming fast. The question is: Are we ready for touchless cars?
Leap Motion has been improving its vanishing interfaces for years, but only for PCs. The first touch free controllers for tablets will go on sale later this year. The connected car market is one of their ultimate goals.
The next generation of Leap Motion software tracks not just fingers, but the entire skeletal structure of the hand. That allows the system to understand where fingers are placed even when they are partially obscured. This more robust gesture tracking and prediction software will allow the company to enter markets where safety is a critical issue, such as in heads up displays in cars.
As of February of this year, 38 car models were available with standard or optional heads up displays. These are designed to project information on the windshield so drivers can keep their eyes on the road. Heads up displays are better than dash displays for offering directional advice, personalized functions and news/entertainment controls. The next hurdle is that drivers still need to take their hands off the wheel and touch a knob or issue voice commands, both of which have their own problems.
A hands-free gesture reader is certainly possible and seems to have a built-in market, as long as it can meet safety and confidence expectations. Michael Buckwald, CEO of Leap Motion, offered three use cases where he sees great potential for Leap Motion in cars in the near future:
Backseat Driver: The first and easiest deployment would be for someone in the rear seat controlling his or her own entertainment system by gesture only.
Virtual Dials: The second is an option that QNX is currently exploring. Drivers are already controlling volume, station and other info with their voices, sometimes with disappointing or hilarious results. The gesture-reading must be much more reliable to prevent accidental road rage.
Heads Up: The third possible use is the one that Leap Motion is most excited about in the long run. Combined with a rich heads up display, the software would allow drivers to make their intentions known without taking their hands off the wheel. Finger movements would be enough to communicate a great range of operational controls. With this set-up, a driver could launch a GPS direction search and have the route overlaid on the actual road with other important route information like delays and road work. The connected cars of the very near future will be able to communicate with surrounding stores or home appliances. To process all that new data, cars will require an easier interface than a dashboard full of buttons and dials.
There is no question that the current UI choices are going away as processors get better at crunching numbers and predicting behavior. Although Leap Motion has had some difficult quarters recently that disappointed industry analysts, the company is aggressively entering Japan and China to make up for lost time. Cars are definitely moving toward gesture-reading, no matter who gets there first. The writing may not be on the wall, after all. It could just be projected onto thin air.
Driving Curve Is An Entry Level Car Tracker
The connected car is a thing of the present – not the future. Already, news-making apps like Automatic and Dash have promised to keep track of cars and driving habits, uploading statics and data to the web. Those apps, though, generally work through Bluetooth on-board devices that leverage ports in the car under the steering wheel. Driving Curve, the latest iteration of these connected car apps, wants to bring the benefits of quantized driving experiences to non-tech-savvy users by removing the plug-in adapter feature found with many other car trackers. Instead, Driving Curve utilizes data from GPS satellites and the iPhone’s motion sensors to keep track of acceleration information, braking speed, fuel usage, and the distance of the route. Driving Curve’s founders have said that they’re open to monetization of the platform, and are presently looking to partner with brands and companies who will leverage the data they collect in meaningful ways. As of yet, they’re looking to turn driving into a gamified activity, awarding points for safe driving in comparison to other users. And, you have to be connected to the Internet to get the most out of the app: it’ll only work with wifi. Nonetheless, it’s a great way to take some of the technological barriers out of the way of the era of the connected, quantified car experience.
MWC 2014: RealVNC Revolutionizes The Connected Car
UK’s RealVNC do a very simple thing that is set to revolutionize the connected car: they mirror the screen on your phone on a touch screen in your car. Their technology, on display at MWC 2014, also powers “MirrorLink”– a platform being rolled out by the Car Connectivity Consortium, which included members like Honda, Toyota, Mazda, Samsung, LG, Sony, HTC, VW, Hyundai, Fiat, and Renault.
For years RealVNC has focused on PC to PC linking products that have been used by millions, but it’s put a strong emphasis on the mobile automotive space in the last 2 years. It sells its technology to a variety of car manufacturers, and counts itself among the members of the Car Connectivity Consortium.
The Consortium’s goal is to make it easier for developers to create apps for the connected car by letting automobiles access apps downloaded to your phone. They also will be enforcing safety standards for those apps to make sure that drivers only utilize apps safe for use on the road. With a large booth in the walkway between halls at MWC, the consortium was able to draw significant attention at the conference.
MirrorLink uses a simple USB cable to connect your phone to your car, and it will be available in certain vehicle models this year including the VW Gulf. HTC will have it pre-installed in certain phones, and had a Gulf on display at its MWC booth with a few MirrorLink apps users can download in the Google Play store. Once the devices are linked, all actions you take on the car’s touch screen are mirrored on the phone in real time– including calls you make.
See the photo below of MirrorLink in action in the VW Gulf.
New System Monitors Car Driver’s Brain Waves
A new system that can read a driver’s brain waves might thwart carjacking, and increase car security in general. As the car becomes more and more connected, this technology looks to solve the problem of continuous verification, which is necessary to ensure that the same driver is constantly driving the car. While technologies like passwords, fingerprint recognition, and iris scanners are present in different degrees, to be totally secure, the driver needs to continuously prove their identity whilst driving, and this new system looks to solve that problem. Ideally, the driver would wear headgear containing sensors that continuously measure brain waves, and if the system detected the wrong brain waves, the vehicle would be safely stopped. It will be interesting to see this technology comes to fruition in the near future, and what it does mean for the future of the connected car.
