Connected car news this week is short due to extensive coverage of the Los Angeles Auto Show for cousin publication Auto Futures. In connected car news this week were Hella, Faurencia, Volvo, Ericsson, Luminar, GM, Velodyne and Volkswagen.
Hella and Faurencia
The lighting and electronics specialist HELLA and Faurecia, one of the world’s leading automotive technology companies, will cooperate in a strategic partnership for the development of innovative interior lighting solutions.
Within this cooperation, both companies will jointly develop lighting with high-technology content in the domain of surface-lighting and dynamic-lighting for a more personalized cockpit environment. Faurecia contributes its expertise as a complete system integrator for vehicle interiors and HELLA supplies innovative products in the field of interior lighting.
Volvo Selects Ericsson
Ericsson has been selected by Volvo Car Group (Volvo Cars) to provide the industrialized Ericsson Connected Vehicle Cloud (CVC) platform to further enable its digital vehicle services in more than 120 markets worldwide for the next five years.
Volvo Cars, like other major players in the automotive industry, is increasing focus on securing high-quality connected-vehicle services as digitalization increases the importance of software services. The services will also benefit from the increased speed, low-latency and capacity for mission critical applications, such as autonomous driving, that commercial 5G networks will enable.
The deal – which will enable Volvo Cars to provide car owners and drivers with its latest developments in connected car digital services such as automation, fleet management, telematics, navigation, and infotainment – is the largest to date for Ericsson Connected Vehicle Cloud.
Volvo & Luminar Partnership
Volvo Cars and Luminar, a leading start-up in the development of core sensing technology for autonomous vehicles, are demonstrating the most advanced LiDAR sensor and perception capabilities to date at this year’s Automobility LA trade show in Los Angeles.
The ongoing development of LiDAR technology, which uses pulsed laser signals to detect objects, is a crucial element in creating safe autonomous cars. It allows autonomous cars to navigate safely in complex traffic environments and at higher speeds by providing these cars with reliable long-range perception capabilities.
Technology such as LiDAR can help Volvo Cars to make its vision for autonomous travel, as showcased in the Volvo 360c concept earlier this year, a reality. The development of advanced LiDAR technology and perception capabilities is one of many ways in which Volvo Cars and its partners work towards a safe introduction of fully autonomous cars.
The new perception capabilities being developed by Luminar in partnership with Volvo Cars make it possible for the system to detect human poses including individual limbs such as arms and legs, a level of detail not previously possible with this type of sensor. The new technology is also able to detect objects at a range of up to 250 meters, a much further range than any LiDAR technology currently available
GM Steps Closer to Commercial Autonomy
General Motors (NYSE: GM) and Cruise are taking the next step toward commercializing autonomous vehicle technology with the appointment of Dan Ammann as CEO of Cruise. Kyle Vogt, Cruise co-founder, will partner with Ammann to set strategic direction for the company and will lead technology development as Cruise president and chief technology officer. The appointments are effective Jan. 1, 2019.
Under Vogt’s leadership, Cruise has emerged as an industry leader in autonomous vehicle technology, growing from 40 employees to more than 1,000 at its San Francisco headquarters and recently announced an additional expansion of 100-200 employees in Seattle. With recent investments by SoftBank and Honda, Cruise’s valuation has rapidly grown to $14.6 billion.
Velodyne for ThorDrive
Utilizing Velodyne Lidar sensors, ThorDrive, a leading autonomous vehicle (AV) startup, is introducing commercial vehicle services in the first of many pilots.
Continental and Turo announced a collaboration to bring instant mobility to users through the exciting new application, Turo Go. The growing community of Turo members will now be able to book and unlock cars at the touch of a button through the smartphone application. This feature will provide a seamless car booking experience to Turo users that don’t always have the time to deliver keys in person. Turo Go will be launched during the LA Auto Show and expand to new markets in the coming months.
VW Invests in diconium and Cloud
The Volkswagen Group is investing in the German digital specialist diconium and acquiring 49 percent of the shares in the com-pany. With this participation, the Volkswagen Group will be securing further know-how and strengthening its digital business capabilities. Together, the two companies will continue the development of Volkswagen’s business models and digital added-value services.
diconium will therefore become a key technology partner for the development of new digital services available via the Volkswagen Automotive Cloud. The completion of the participation transaction is still subject to approval by the anti-trust authorities.
diconium (formerly dmc), with headquarters in Stuttgart, was established in 1995 and is a leading specialist in the holistic development of digital business models. Its activities include strategy development and the design of the user experience (UX), as well as the implementation and operational realization of business ideas. The proprietor-managed company has a total workforce of about 800 people working at locations in Germany, Portugal, the USA and India. The core competences of diconium include the development of sales platforms for digital products and services as well as IT systems in customer management.
Volkswagen Automotive Cloud to be the basis of digital value-added services in the connected vehicle
With diconium as a technology partner, the Volkswagen Group is taking the next step in its digitalization efforts. The objective is to offer customers digital value-added services quickly and easily for their vehicles, which will then be fully connected. The Volkswagen brand has taken the lead within the Group and is developing the Volkswagen Automotive Cloud together with Microsoft – this will link the connected vehicle, the cloud-based platform and digital services.
“At Volkswagen, we intend to expand our core business sustainably and to offer our customers more and more tailor-made digital value-added services in and around their vehicles,” says Christoph Hartung, Head of Digital & New Business / Mobility Services of the Volkswagen brand. “For this purpose, we are taking technology partners on board to assist us with development. Together, we will offer customers a wide and convenient range of services that they can use with their mobile devices or in their cars. With diconium, we have secured the support of a strong technology partner with substantial experience and considerable competence in the development of digital sales solutions.”
Among other activities, Volkswagen and diconium intend to launch a global online sales platform allowing Volkswagen customers to purchase and manage all the upcoming “We” services and on-demand functions for their connected vehicles. The functions available will include multimedia streaming, automatic payment for fuel, battery charging and parking, and over-the-air updates.
Jacobs ADT
Jacobs Vehicle Systems has introduced Active Decompression Technology (ADT), enabling heavy-duty commercial vehicles to benefit from an engine stop-start system and eliminating engine-shake at both start-up and shutdown. In addition to improving fuel economy and reducing emissions, ADT also improves cold engine starts, reduces loading and wear on engine components during start-up, and makes start-up faster.
Jacobs’ ADT device incorporates valve actuation technologies proven over many millions of miles and can be cost-effectively added to many engine platforms.
Stop-start engine technology, which automatically switches off the engine when it would otherwise be idling, is widely adopted by automotive manufacturers, however, it is less common in heavy-duty commercial vehicles. This is largely due to the intrusive engine and cabin-shake experienced whenever a heavy-duty diesel engine starts or stops, and because of the cost of technologies needed to mitigate increased wear-and-tear on the starter motor, ring-gear, and battery. ADT significantly reduces these issues.
Extensive testing has shown that ADT reduces the magnitude of engine-shake during shutdown by 90 percent, which is when vibrations transmitted to the cabin are of greatest frequency and strength. This has the additional benefit of preventing disturbance to drivers sleeping in cabs overnight when there are automated engine starts and stops to maintain battery charge.
Henkel & RLE Protects Batteries
At the upcoming Battery Electric Vehicle Architectures Congress Europe 2018 (BEVA Europe) in London on December 5 and 6, Henkel and RLE International will present a fresh new approach to the protection of battery units in next-generation electrical vehicles.
Facing the challenges of battery protection in electric vehicles (EV), Henkel and RLE International have investigated and validated the use of hybrid structural solutions vs. conventional designs for effective EV battery protection. The study comprises full simulation of optimized rocker panel and other parts in standard automotive side (pole), front and rear crash scenarios. At the same time, it reveals a significant lightweighting potential to compensate the added weight of EV batteries.
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