Commentary

Connecting Cars On The Road To Driverless

Before cars become driverless, they will become significantly more connected.

And the connections will bring to drivers features and activities in addition to those related to actual driving.

Car systems will be able to connect and communicate with home appliances as well as sensors along a travel route, providing precise traffic and driving information.

There will be unseen technologies, such as networked sensors to keep vehicles from running into each other, and systems that can place orders based on projected location arrival times.

Car manufacturers are morphing into partial technology companies, with their vehicles increasingly becoming prime conduits of consumer information and behavior.

Meanwhile, technology companies are jumping into the car business, leveraging their knowledge of consumer online behaviors combined with their experience in creating and deploying new technological capabilities.

This all is on the road to driverless cars, as highlighted in a recent interview of a top Nissan exec with Automotive News in Europe.

“We are launching a system next year that can manage traffic jams on the motorway,” said  Richard Candler, Nissan Europe’s head of advanced product planning.” By 2020, we will have cars that can basically drive themselves in every situation. It will take some time for the consumer to get used to these systems. We will start by taking away some of the pain points of driving, such as traffic jams and long journeys on motorways.”

At CES two years ago, major automakers displayed how they would incorporate mobile apps into dashboards, essentially extending the abilities of the driver’s smartphone.

In the short term, smartphones still are needed as a communication hub for many of the connected vehicle features. But that will change over time, with the car becoming the communication center.

Much like a smartphone can still be used to make a phone call, the car of the future can still be used for transporting a person.

10 comments about "Connecting Cars On The Road To Driverless".
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  1. R MARK REASBECK from www.USAonly.US , February 15, 2016 at 10:31 a.m.

    Chuck, your columns are like a train wreck, I've to keep coming back to take a look.  I'm just amazed at the thinking of taking complete control of your vehicle is "FREEING"?  I see this as a trap.  For instance , they claim above that they will control traffic jams.  Just like the global warming farce, it's based on computer models, which don't mean squat in the real world. Growing up in the Nevada desert, we watched engineers for decades design flood channels based on the volume of water from mountain downpours.  Every year we would watch the currents completely destroy these concrete water diversions because  they underestimated the volume.
    So , in order to be "Traffic Jam Free" , you have to be able to determine  the "current".  How will you control the freedom of peopel to travel?  what will happen when there is a freeway accident, which will happen, because this concept of UNmanned cars will fail. It's a  known fact of failure is inevitable  just like what eventually happens to your laptop, PC, Smartphone, or garage door opener.  In spite of tech-nuts thinking the computer control is flawless, it's still mechanical, subject to contamination of devious , on purpose corruption, the failure of the sytem itself, or the infamous, "UPGRADE" that NEVER works the first time.  Once again, keep your hands off my steering wheel, brakes and gas pedal.

  2. Paula Lynn from Who Else Unlimited, February 15, 2016 at 11:02 a.m.

    R Mark Reasbeck: Exactly plus all it takes is for "one hand on the button" so to speak to blow up anyone or more anytime in spades. There is no cap on nefarious people or where they are located. Plus, when we are all tracked and datafied, certain groups of people can be targeted for any reason for their vehicles to die or them to die before or after the drones are programmed to target groups of any kind to be sprayed with bullets. 

  3. Chuck Martin from Chuck Martin replied, February 15, 2016 at 11:23 a.m.

    Just to clarify, Mark, the comment about traffic jam free is not my concept, it was a statement from Nissan, as stated in the column. We attempt to refelect here what is occuring in the land of IoT. Tp be sure, there are MANY complex issues ahead, some of which you articulaated here. I am not the one coming for your steering wheel.

  4. R MARK REASBECK from www.USAonly.US , February 15, 2016 at 11:36 a.m.

    Paula:  Dang, girl you really exposed your tin-foil hat.  But the sad part is, this kind of stuff is now  things we have to really think about,  who has control of what?  I have said before, whose "moral code" will be programmed when a school bus full of kids  is on a head-n collision  with  2 elderly people in their Crown Vic?  Who is liable in a fatality?  How does insurance cover a car?  Discount for "technology"?  In the case of a fatality, who gets proscecuted , the car, the owner, the server, the GPS designer?  Will they shut off your car for non-payment of insurance, Child support, a warrant, IRS lien?   This is such a nightmare of epic proportion waiting to happen.  There are 3,900,000 miles of road in the US, but it all starts with one electronic sensor.............
    which reminds me my compass "sensor" just went out on my rear view mirror, now I have no idea what direction I'm going................good thing it wasn't one of those blind spot warning sensors, I REALLY DEPEND ON THAT ONE.

  5. R MARK REASBECK from www.USAonly.US replied, February 15, 2016 at 12:25 p.m.

    Oh I know Chuck, Not Shooting the Messanger.  Nissan should concentrate  on not manufacturing the ugliest cars on the road  (Juke?)

  6. Michael Elling from IVP Capital, LLC, February 15, 2016 at 2:59 p.m.

    Let's just hope that the focus on connectivity gets back to the network performance of the mobile carriers.  VoLTE calls drop 5x more than regular calls (and those are pretty poor when we're talking 5 9s of reliability, let alone redundancy).  Rather than work together to improve the performance at the edge of their networks (and due to cell coverage and reach it is a rather large number) and implement device to device mesh protocols like LTE-D, the carriers remain rooted in their silos and believe that is the best business model.  When will they learn that it is not?  Let the edge be generative and boost traffic.  There are many ways both at the core and edge that carriers can work together and with 3rd parties to improve reliability and throughput to the point that we'll all feel comfortable trusting our AVs to be tethered to or by them.

  7. Chuck Martin from Chuck Martin, February 15, 2016 at 3:19 p.m.

    Right, Michael, much more integration of the sort you describe will be needed for any of this to move forward. And then there is the promise/potential of 5G.

  8. Michael Elling from IVP Capital, LLC replied, February 15, 2016 at 4:50 p.m.

    Chuck.  "The promise/potential of 5G."  I'm trying really hard not to laugh.  Michael

  9. Chuck Martin from Chuck Martin, February 15, 2016 at 5:06 p.m.

    Right, Michael, it is the "promise," not necesarily the delivery.

  10. Paula Lynn from Who Else Unlimited replied, February 15, 2016 at 8:19 p.m.

    And Dick Tracy was only for the comics - talk into a watch - crazies. See you in the funny papers. Who is going to force you to have a driverless car because the system won't work with human frailities ? BTW, are you saying drones can't be programmed drop targeted bombs ?

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