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Mobile Apps in Connected Vehicles

The tendency of using and developing various applications for our everyday usage has appeared in our lives already for a while, and ultimately is entering also the automotive field, making it a continuously growing sector. Surely the fact that apps improve safety and offer a better driving experience, providing information regarding the surrounding infrastructure, attracts the attention of car users and causes a rise in the number of new apps developed. 

This trend has such a great influence that now manufacturers are starting to design cars taking care of their interaction with mobile phones. For example, starting from 2017 Volvo will sell keyless cars, thanks to an app that makes it possible to open and start the vehicle remotely. 

Another sector that is involved and could coherently benefit from this innovation is car sharing. For instance, offering the possibility to private parties to share their cars directly with other people or to rent them to companies. The advantage of this is that it could help in the formation of so-called small car sharing companies that do not have high initial investments.

The safety aspect should also be concerned since guarantees for both parties are required, thus general health tests should be made together with the eventual alcohol and drug control. For the insurance aspects the general strategies could be adopted, like the one already used by the company Uber.

Regarding the safety problem it could be possible to make a test to check if the driver is in an altered condition. This test can have great influence since everyday there are car accidents due to the use of drugs and alcohol.

Talking about the successful parties on the market, the iOnRoad application could be introduced. The main functionality consists in guaranteeing a real time driving assistance, moreover warning the driver in the case of a possible collision or any other type of danger. The video recording service is also foreseen in order to assist in the critical situations, such as an accidental collision.

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“Testing new technologies in a realistic off-roadway environment is an essential step before a significant number of highly automated vehicles can be deployed safely on actual roadways. Working with the Michigan Department of Transportation, U-M researchers have designed Mcity, a unique test facility for evaluating the capabilities of connected and automated vehicles and systems.”   [From University of Michigan Website]

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Enabling technologies in connected vehicles

Enabling technologies are inventions or innovations that can be applied to drive radical change in the capabilities of a user or culture. Speaking of connected vehicles, crucial enabling technologies are:

Internet of Things

The idea itself of connected vehicles recalls the concept of IoT, since it implies a communication between vehicles and other entities. This kind of interaction is broadly referred to as V2X, i.e. Vehicle-To-Everything. IoT, in turn, relies upon data generation and transmission.

Networks

Due to safety concerns, communication between vehicles must happen in real-time, thus making speed a key requirement. The main communication protocols object of interest are the DSRC (Dedicated Short Range Communications) and the LTE V2X. The first one has been assigned the same frequency band (5.9 GHz) both in Europe and in the USA, so that the same devices can be used wherever. In the future LTE will extend the vehicle reach, i.e. its capability to interact with other devices up to 500 m away.

Sensors and actuators

Smaller and smaller sensors provide more information from the surrounding environment and eventually allow to take decisions on more solid grounds and to actively modify the vehicle behavior thanks to smart actuators.

Technology for storing and organizing big data

V2X, due to multiple connections (e.g. Vehicle-To-Vehicle, Vehicle-To-Infrastructure, Vehicle-To-Device, etc.), obviously generates remarkable volumes of data. These data must be stored in a structured way before being processed. Depending on the application, data crunching may take place on the vehicle ECU or on external servers, i.e. cloud computing.

Cloud Computing

Cloud computing is used to describe data acquisition or distribution through the Internet and wireless networks. Beyond technological advantages, its utilization provides cost savings. In fact, with fewer expensive data storage elements in the vehicle, the cost of our increasingly computerized cars might decrease.

Machine Learning

Thanks to the acquisition of real-time data from the various sensors, the system is continually learning and improving upon itself, increasing reliability, safety and performance. The goal is to gather “experience” in order to come up with a truly autonomous vehicle.