TrafficInfraTech Magazine Linking People Places & Progress
Connected Cars present a great opportunity for India to develop smarter & safer cities. We aim to bring technology which makes the car smarter and interactive for the car occupants.
Bruno Grippay
As part of Nissan’s Intelligent Mobility vision, we aim to bring technology which makes the car smarter and interactive for the car occupants. One such feature is the forward collision warning which helps cars predict how soon to brake, to avoid collision with the car ahead.”
“As connectivity advances, another important feature would be vehicles being able to talk to traffic lights, pedestrians & other cars for smarter integration. This will help create cities which are significantly optimized from traffic perspective and far safer.
“With connected cars evolving, technology companies and OEMs are working together more closely than ever. Telematics companies are a subset of this and for them a car transforming into a Connected Car presents huge opportunities. The entire technology – TCU/ Dongle, Backend & Mobile Application is built by different companies for OEMs. Different OEMs are adopting strategies to develop all/some of it in-house and outsource the rest. Nissan is working with telematics companies & technology providers to launch the Connectivity solutions for its cars.”
But are these tech and OEM collaborations likely to encourage the evolution of mobility into a service, moving away from traditional vehicle ownership?
Grippay said, “Mobility as a service is a phenomenon that is already catching up in a big way. The ridesharing companies have given consumers a reliable option for daily mobility. For the GenX, car ownership is probably not as important as some of their other needs. Hence this is a trend OEMs cannot possibly avoid and must ride on it to drive maximum profitability.
“That said OEMs are playing their part in moving into the mobility space with smart investments as well some pilot initiatives. Nissan has done a shared mobility pilot using its electric vehicle- Leaf in Japan. We would expect to see OEM participation in this space to increase significantly in the coming years.”
Connected cars are becoming increasingly popular. Mercedes Benz started to equip its cars with a communication-box to have connectivity as standard way back in 2014. Now all their model ranges have connectivity as standard equipment in 45 markets. Georg Walthart, Global Communications, Mercedes-Benz Cars said, “The driver needs to have traffic information in real- time for his navigation, or navigation map updates over the air, or online search for navigation destinations. Besides, in Europe we have equipped all cars with an automatic emergence call system as standard since 2016.
With rise in connected vehicle technology, the government has to set the framework for a good infrastructure for all relevant technologies and data security.
Georg Walthart
