In connected car news this week were the Tesla 3, GM, DENSO, Lexus, Toyota, Cypress, Qualcomm, Nexar and Marvell.
First Tesla 3 Owners Drive Away Keyless
Elon Musk was the first customer to receive a Tesla 3 which doesn’t have an instrument cluster, just a center 15″ screen. The back seats fold down. The base model costs $35,000 and has a 220-mile battery range. Production begins in the US, with the Long Range Battery models first.
The Model 3 owners did not get keys to their new cars, they can instead enter and start their cars with smartphones or NFC cards.
Customer deliveries begin in late October Production of the Standard Battery begins in November 2017. Owners have to pay for supercharging.
The Premium Model 3 with a 310 mile battery range will cost $44,000, the car can accelerate to 60 mph in 5.1 seconds and reach a top speed of 140 mph. The Premium model also gets heated seating, open pore wood décor, two rear USBs,12-way, power adjustable front seats, steering column and side mirrors, with custom driver profiles, Premium audio system , tinted glass roof, auto dimming, power folding, heated side mirrors, LED fog lamps, center console with covered storage and docking for two smartphones.
All-Wheel Drive production begins in the Spring, of 2018 for Model 3. International deliveries of left-hand drive vehicles begin in the second half of the year. Finally, right hand drive vehicles will begin productioin in 2019.
OTA 4 GM in 2020
Mary Barra said that General Motors is working over-the-air OTA updates to be deployed for infotainment systems by 2020.
Cypress for DENSO & 2017 Toyota Camry
Cypress Semiconductor Corp. announced that global automotive supplier DENSO Corporation has selected Cypress’ Traveo™ automotive microcontroller (MCU) family and FL-S Serial NOR Flash memory family to drive the advanced graphics in its instrument cluster for the 2017 Toyota Camry. The DENSO instrument cluster uses Traveo devices that were the industry’s first 3D-capable ARM® Cortex®-R5 cluster MCUs, and they provide greater memory savings, increased safety features and rich image capabilities. The FL-S memory in the cluster is based on Cypress’ proprietary MirrorBit® NOR Flash process technology, which enables the highest density serial NOR Flash memory in the industry by storing two bits per cell. The DENSO instrument cluster has 4.2- and 7.0-inch screens capable of audio, video and navigation in the center display of the 2017 Toyota Camry.
DENSO for Toshiba –AI Cooperation
Toshiba Electronic announced that DENSO Corporation (DENSO) is deploying Visconti™4, its latest image-recognition processor dedicated to automotive applications, in next generation, front-camera-based active safety systems. Visconti™4 is a leading-edge, multi-engine road-safety solution that provides drivers with real-time analytics of road conditions and potential dangers.
The Visconti™4 image recognition processor is equipped with eight media processing engines, allowing it to execute eight applications simultaneously. It can detect and analyze camera-generated images and recognizes traffic lanes; nearby vehicles, both parked and moving; traffic signs and signals; the headlights of oncoming vehicles; plus the most vulnerable road users of all, bicyclists and pedestrians.
Visconti™4 has double the number of processing engines of its predecessor, the Visconti™2, used by DENSO since 2015. It also integrates a new image recognition algorithm, Enhanced CoHOG Accelerator1 that delivers enhanced processing of luminance differences between objects and their backgrounds to better detect pedestrians at night and low light conditions.
Toshiba and DENSO are also cooperating in AI, on the development of deep neural network-intellectual property (DNN-IP) for use in image recognition, and plan to bring this state-of-the-art technology to future additions to the Visconti series.
DENSO Sensor & Radar in Lexus LS
DENSO Corporation announced two new products to be incorporated in the new 2018 Lexus LS, which will be released in Japan and U.S. after this fall. A new stereo vision sensor and millimeter-wave radar sensor will help improve safety performance of vehicles by more precisely detecting obstacles and lane lines on roads.
The stereo vision sensor uses 3D image processing techniques called “dense stereo matching” to detect obstacles of different shapes, including pedestrians, vehicles, and guardrails, as well as empty road spaces marked by lane lines. This enables autonomous emergency braking and automatic steering control to avoid obstacles. The product’s highly sophisticated cameras can also better detect pedestrians at night.
The new millimeter-wave radar sensor provides higher pedestrian detection performance in a more compact module. More frequent radio waves emission also detects obstacles with higher sensitivity, particularly pedestrians approaching from the sides. Furthermore, the product’s radar beam can be emitted over a wider angular range, without requiring a mechanism to adjust the angle, as with previous versions. This reduces its size by 60 percent compared to conventional radar sensors, thereby allowing for easier installation.
Qualcomm & Nichicon Partner for WEVC
Qualcomm Incorporated and Nichicon Corporation announced that they have entered into a Wireless Electric Vehicle Charging (WEVC) license agreement. Nichicon will include Qualcomm Halo™ WEVC technology in its product portfolio and will focus on commercializing WEVC systems for Plug-In Hybrid (PHEV) and Electric Vehicle (EV) manufacturers across Asia. Based on the agreement, Nichicon intends to develop, manufacture and supply WEVC systems based on Qualcomm Halo technology.
A leading specialist in automotive power electronics equipment, Nichicon will deliver WEVC systems, supported by Qualcomm’s comprehensive technical support. The company is a trusted automotive supplier and works extensively across Asia, notably in Japan.
By this agreement Qualcomm has granted Nichicon a royalty bearing license to develop, make and supply WEVC systems based on Qualcomm Halo technology. Qualcomm will also provide a comprehensive technology transfer package to help Nichicon to develop commercially and technically viable WEVC systems and support the future design of improved WEVC systems.
Nexar SDK for Qualcomm Snapdragon AI on Smartphones
Nexar, provider of a free safety AI dashcam app and the world’s first vehicle-to-vehicle (V2V) communication network, is announcing the first driving safety application leveraging the Qualcomm Snapdragon Neural Processing Engine (NPE) SDK. The Nexar app will now be able to provide advanced driver-assistance systems (ADAS), including unprecedented real-time forward-collision warnings and other life-saving features, to hundreds of millions of vehicles whose drivers own Android phones or have Android-based in-vehicle systems.
The Snapdragon NPE SDK is designed to allow deep learning and AI to be executed directly on the CPU, GPU and DSP of Snapdragon 800 and 600 tier Android mobile devices, instead of on the cloud, bringing the revolution of AI to edge devices, and providing a wealth of new opportunities for software developers in the automotive space.
Te Quiero Taco Bell Para Lyft con Taco Mode
In partnership with rideshare company Lyft, the brand will bring fans directly to Taco Bell. That’s right, for the first time, fans can officially add a Taco Bell stop to their Lyft ride with just the click of a button. The two brands are joining forces to satisfy cravings with “Taco Mode.”
Taco Mode is an in-app option for Lyft passengers, providing them the ultimate Taco Bell experience including swag, custom in-car menu, a tricked-out taco-themed car and a free Doritos Locos Taco1 when you “ride-thru” Taco Bell on the way to your next destination.
UberEats Delivery for McDonald’s
From New York City to New Zealand and Canada to the Netherlands, McDonald’s has expanded McDelivery with UberEATS to 13 countries, including 3,500 restaurants in the U.S. in the past three months. McDelivery is now available across the globe from over 7,800 restaurants in 47 countries and six continents.
McDonald’s is marked the milestone with Global McDelivery Day, by surprising customers who order McDelivery on July 26th with special deliveries and fun McDonald’s moments.
In the U.S., model Chrissy Teigen delivered McDelivery Collection gear for several group deliveries in New York City.
Drexel Researchers Develop Super Fast Battery with MXene
Faster charging batteries are on the way. A team, led by Yury Gogotsi, PhD, Distinguished University and Bach professor in Drexel’s College of Engineering, in the Department of Materials Science and Engineering, created the new electrode designs from a highly conductive, two-dimensional material called MXene. Their design could make energy storage devices like batteries, viewed as the plodding tanker truck of energy storage technology, just as fast as the speedy supercapacitors that are used to provide energy in a pinch — often as a battery back-up or to provide quick bursts of energy for things like camera flashes.
Continental Looking for Tech Experts to Experiment
What will the mobility of the future look like? How will topics such as electrification and connectivity change our daily lives? Continental is looking for the answers to these questions at the IAA 2017 in Frankfurt. Under the slogan “Turn Fiction into Science”, the technology company will hold four competitions on the trend topics in mobility from September 14 to 24, 2017. Together with Continental experts, small teams will compete and develop ideas and new approaches to issues concerning electrification and connectivity. The results will then be presented to a jury, which will announce the most innovative proposals from all of the ideas. All of the winners will have the chance to win one of four trips to the world’s largest technology trade fair, the Consumer Electronics Show (CES), in Las Vegas in January 2018.
Marvell at Secure Automotive Ethernet Switch
Marvell a leader in storage, networking, and connectivity semiconductor solutions, announced the industry’s first secure automotive gigabit Ethernet switch, enabling a new level of safe data transmission in next-generation connected vehicles.The new automotive Ethernet switch, the latest addition to Marvell’s automotive portfolio of wired and wireless network solutions, is designed to prevent malicious attacks or compromises to the data streamed in-and-out of the vehicle. These industry-leading security features are paramount to ensure the safety of the vehicle and its occupants.
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