Independence Day drivers and driverless cars

Looking ahead at the future of driverless cars.

Independence Day drivers and driverless cars

5 minutes

Millions of Americans are gearing up for what analysts say will be the most traveled Independence Day holiday in history. A record-breaking 44.2 million Americans will travel 50 miles or more away from home, says travel group AAA, and the vast majority will journey in a car. As autonomous driving tech become more visible, one question is bound to come up: when will we take this trip in a driverless car?

Already, technology exists to move driverless cars through controlled environments such as stretches of highway, self-contained city districts and even a speedway. Now new players—excited by the possibility of autonomous--are emerging to bring fresh ideas to the business of making and selling vehicles.

Forecasting a $77 billion market

Changes are coming fast. By 2030, around a quarter of all miles driven in the U.S. could be in shared autonomous electric vehicles, according to research from The Boston Consulting Group. NYC, LA, Dallas and other cities with 1 million plus people are expected to be impacted first. By 2035, the market for fully autonomous vehicles could reach $77 billion, the firm estimates.

Why is it happening so quickly? Barriers to entry are falling, so it’s becoming possible for smaller companies to enter the vehicle making business. Drive trains, for instance, are moving to electric, which are a lot less complicated (and less expensive) than traditional gas fired engines to make. Furthermore, 3D printing and other specialized manufacturing tools are exponentially improving. Taken together, these developments help open opportunities to niche providers.

Changing consumer behavior

What’s more, consumer behavior and other market fundamentals are changing. Today, people don’t have a car for every scenario so they compromise—a well-used pick-up truck that also functions as wheels to a black-tie gala; a sports car that also shuttles kids to school. Expect to see vehicles developed for specific purposes: a breakfast car, a date car, a workout car.

Domino’s has caught on. It rolled out 155 specially designed DXP delivery vehicles each with an oven and space for 80 pizzas, sides, soda and dipping sauces. The custom vehicles now shuttle pizzas to customers in places like Houston, Detroit and New Orleans. And if the trend expands, fleet owners -- such as Domino’s, large apartment buildings or university campuses -- will dictate specifications of their custom designed vehicles.

A glimpse at the future

At CES, where the auto ecosystem goes to see and discuss some of the coolest ideas in vehicle technology, the drumbeat of deals earlier this year among friends, foes turned friends, and startups provided a glimpse of what’s to come. Companies announced open innovation initiatives, code sharing agreements and acquisitions to support the development of driverless cars and smart infrastructure. Panasonic, for one, teamed up with Qualcomm Technologies to show an IVI system built on Android’s automotive features that control in-vehicle functions such as HVAC, and demonstrated the integration of Google's services and popular Android applications with the system.

Collaborating with startups

In “The Long Tail: Why the Future of Business is Selling Less of More,” author Chris Anderson argues that companies including car makers have expanded their product range so much that some can claim they sell no identical products. In other words, they are selling to niche groups, even a “market of one.” This change impacts the supply chain. Some Tier 1 auto suppliers, such as Panasonic, spend more time not only creating their own technology, but also evaluating, testing and supporting nascent entrepreneurial ideas that could be fundamental to future driverless cars. In this scenario, purchasing departments, for example, take on a much greater role as third party ecosystem managers which involves code sharing, open innovation and other partnerships.

The work is happening around the globe including in Atlanta on the edge of Georgia Tech where engineers at the Panasonic Automotive Innovation Center in Atlanta, are working with Georgia Tech researchers and startups to discover and validate cutting edge technologies related to energy storage, heat management, air filtering, optics, deep learning and machine vision—that could form the future of the custom built “breakfast car” that takes you to work in 2035.

Read more about autonomous driving in the Consumer Road to Driverless Cars.

About our expert: John Avery manages Panasonic's Automotive Innovation Center in Atlanta, which is focused on next-gen auto technology. John is a serial entrepreneur with multiple successful startups.

A look at the auto supply chain
Authors
John Avery - Manager of Panasonic's Automotive Innovation Center
Avery is focused on next-gen auto technology.

Five tech terms driving Intelligent Transportation

C-V2X released for Autonomous Transportation

Five tech terms driving Intelligent Transportation

5 minutes

The next generation of cars set to roll off the assembly line is compelling proof that technology is evolving at a rapid rate. Blink and connected vehicle features like onboard Alexa, pedestrian detection, and adaptive cruise control will all come standard – merely scratching the surface of what’s in the works.

As futurist Ray Kurweil aptly predicted, the next era of transportation progress isn’t a century away, or even decades down the road. 

In fact, it will be here this month.
 

C-V2X makes its real-world debut

We’ve been working with partners like the Colorado Department of Transportation (CDOT) to take the idea of a connected vehicle ecosystem out of the lab and into the real world, focused on delivering a production-grade deployment to Colorado roadways. As was recently announced, Panasonic, Qualcomm Technologies, and Ford Motor Company have joined forces to debut Cellular Vehicle-to-Everything (C-V2X) direct communication technologies in Colorado – the first real-world deployment of its kind in this country. 

What is the goal of the connected highway system we’re building? To improve roadway safety, lower fuel consumption and reduce congestion. Panasonic’s connected vehicle data platform will collect and disseminate real-time V2X data to provide roadway operators with improved situational awareness and a new ability to share safety critical information directly with vehicles.

This collaboration with CDOT, enabled by the Panasonic, Qualcomm Technologies, and Ford Motor Company partnership, is an exciting step towards early commercialization of C-V2X in a real-world setting at scale, setting the stage for the technology to achieve commercial readiness. 

C-V2X directly connects vehicles to each other, infrastructure and people, transforming the transportation experience and paving the road to tomorrow’s autonomous vehicles. C-V2X provides an alternate radio technology to the WiFi-based radio technology known as Dedicated Short-Range Radio Communications (DSRC). C-V2X direct communications is designed to work in ITS spectrum, and its reduced time to deployment is afforded by a radio swap-out, reusing many years of V2X applications research, development and pilot deployment investment. It can benefit from established security and transport layers and application protocols defined by the automotive standards communities. It enables direct communications independent of cellular network coverage or network operator involvement. C-V2X is a modern radio technology that has evolved from mobile LTE Direct technology and optimized for automotive applications. Momentum continues to build around C-V2X because of its superior performance, and 5G compatibility.

The ABC's of C-V2X

Here are four more tech acronyms related to C-V2X that will soon enter the mainstream vernacular as the Intelligent Roadway System rapidly advances. 

1. PC5: AKA sidelink for V2V, V2I and V2P
PC5 may sound like the latest video game console to top your kid’s Christmas list, but this short range direct communication interface is the secret sauce that sets C-V2X apart. Unlike DSRC, which employs technology derived from what’s in the Wi-Fi router in your home, PC5 is designed to benefit from advances in LTE technology to offer increased communication range (~2X), better non-line-of-sight (NLOS) performance, enhanced reliability, higher capacity, and better congestion control in denser environments. PC5 gives the capability to our transportation system to maintain the connectivity that moving vehicles require – and which is needed for safety-critical communication. 

C-V2X has the capability of network communications in addition to direct communications, giving roadway operators state-of-the-art ability to deliver safety and mobility applications and services, in a manner that is cost-efficient.

2. V2N – Vehicle to Network
Not all in-vehicle communication is urgent – sometimes drivers just want to know which route will speed up their morning commute. Vehicle-to-network (V2N) systems connect vehicles to the cellular infrastructure and the cloud so drivers can enjoy connected tech like traffic updates and travel notifications. By leveraging existing cellular networks and mobile ecosystem support, C-V2X offers new business models and economic benefits, which is likely to expedite the deployment of C-V2X-equipped vehicles.

3. 5G – Fifth generation wireless
If you’ve got a device with internet access, you’ve probably heard of 5G, but not necessarily how it’s going to revolutionize driving as we know it. In the very near future, 5G will be the backbone of how we all communicate with each other and our “things,” and this can include safety in between vehicles. C-V2X today provides an evolutionary step towards the use of 5G tomorrow. The benefits of this evolution will include an agnostic, backwards compatible platform that ensures road operators and OEM’s can cost effectively take advantage of new advances in 5G wireless communications. 

4. FOTA – Firmware over-the-air
Cars that can talk to each other understandably raise concerns about cybersecurity. One of the key ways to prevent attacks is to update software regularly, and that’s where Firmware Over-the-Air (FOTA) works its magic. Already an established cloud technology for mobile phones, its application to the automotive world helps to tackle the rapid evolution of connected car systems. FOTA can update a car’s software anywhere – at the showroom, in the garage, on the road. As our vehicles become more computer than machine, FOTA is one of the critical mechanisms for maintaining an up-to-date, secure system more effectively.

 

Authors
Jarrett Wendt - Executive Vice President, Panasonic North America
Nakul Duggal - Vice President of Product Management, Qualcomm Technologies

The eyes have it: biometrics in travel

biometrics header

The eyes have it: biometrics in travel

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Imagine a world of air travel, where the only things you need to board a plane are your luggage and yourself. No more worries about forgotten tickets or passports. If trends continue, it’s easy to see how in airports and air travel, biometric technology, such as fingerprint scanning, facial recognition, or even microchips inserted under the skin, could be used to speed the journey.  
It may happen sooner than you think, as travelers begin to expect what they already use in other industries.

With customer experience and convenience serving as major drivers for the adoption of biometrics, market research firm Goode Intelligence predicts that biometrics will be employed by 1.9 billion banking customers over the next two and a half years. If the 2018 Consumer Electronics Show is anything to go by, we’ll soon be relying on biometrics to access our cars too. Swedish rail company SJ is already using microchips as a form of identification for their transit passengers. 

Jowan Österlund is the founder of Biohax Intl., which carries out the implants for SJ. He looks at it as a way for companies to save both time and physical resources. “This is not just about moving a little bit faster in the line. In the long run, we need to think about how we can optimize our interactions with our digital environment,” he says.

Biometrics Body

Biometrics may be really taking off, but the technology isn’t new. Alastair Partington, founder and Co-CEO of biometrics and identity-technology company Tascent, says airports were the early adopters. More recently airlines have picked up the mantle. “Airports and airlines have begun to jointly innovate with offerings such as biometric bag-drop and biometric boarding, increasingly connecting the passenger journey by offering an integrated experience across multiple touchpoints,” Partington explains.

As with any major technological innovation, biometric technology has its own barriers to adoption, certainly on a widespread scale. Luckily, passengers being hesitant to accept this technology does not seem to be one of them. According to IATA’s 2017 Global Passenger Survey, 64 percent of respondents chose biometric identification as their preferred traveling token over paper documents or their mobile phones.  Learn more about biometric technology and the future travel experience.