Te first panel of the day, Infotainment Standard Time, discussed the best path forward for the connected car. Left to right: mod- erator Brian Cooley, Editor at Large for CNET; Phil Abram of General Motors; Derek Kuhn of QNX Software Systems; Joel Hoffman, automotive strategist with GENIVI; Alan Ewing, president of Car Connectivity Consortium; and Charles Koch of American Honda.
and, if so, how? For the most part, the panel agreed about one thing: due to the rate that new technologies are being developed and consumer’s expectations are soaring, it will be quite some time before industry-wide standardization takes place. The consensus was that this is due to the fragmented nature of the in- dustry between infotainment and UI’s, such as app-enabled head units. “I don’t think the industry
has matured to the point where there’s an obvious solution. From the customer’s perspective, we need to make sure that that phone works with that car,” said Abram, when asked about how phone- to-car integration would be possible. “What makes our lives earlier isn’t necessarily what makes our customer’s lives easier. Bluetooth has been around for 10 to 15 years. The number one problem is Bluetooth pairing. That’s because you have so many different manufacturers with different operating systems because of the nature of the car industry. Standardization is not the answer; execution is the answer.”
Several of the panelists are members of the Car Connec- tivity Consortium, a group that includes Honda and Gen- eral Motors, among others. The purpose of the group is to promote Terminal Mode, now known as Mirrorlink, a set of standards governing how apps are displayed on dashboard screens. This group was estab- lished to help standardize the medium. As a discussion point, the panel discussed the differ- ence between connecting the smartphone via Bluetooth with the vehicle interface and having an already-equipped interface in the car that is an all-in-one function. The panel agreed that since both options are currently in effect in many vehicles, neither option will likely overtake the other, but it will be a blending of both that becomes the standard. “One of the frustrations that
we experience is there is a real desire to cast this as two armed camps and that some- how these are not compatible worlds,” said Ewing. “There’s no reason that multiple ap- proaches can’t be supported. We can’t really say it’s one of the other. We can say that it’s
20 Mobile Electronics January 2014
an evolutionary process where any smartphone is transport- able to virtually any vehicle.” Cooley followed with the
question of cost. “Wouldn’t you all love to get to a simpler vision?” “It’s about value. It’s not about cost,” Koch answered. “If what you put into the car delivers more value to the cus- tomer and you, that’s the right business decision to make.” Throughout the day four other related panels held sim- ilar discussions. A discussion on distracted driving analyzed data regarding the effective- ness of voice-controlled in- terfaces with an emphasis on touch-screen distractions. The Big Data panel discussed the convenience of having data collected from cars towards its use on both engine charac- teristics and driving patterns, but grappled with the drivers’ privacy rights regarding that information. The next two panels focused on the autono- mous car how transportation will ultimately be changed through technology. Although few definite answers emerged from the panels, the myriad questions that were brought up seemed to achieve the ob-
jective of creating a dialogue within the industry towards the end goals for each element of the connected car.
Booth Offerings Media-only access to the LA Auto Show was extend- ed to three days this year to cover the Connected Car Expo. While Sprint and Verizon showcased the latest in-car technology from their respec- tive telematics divisions, other exhibitors included start-ups and some peripherally related companies. Of software and hardware technology, the former side was the most represented at the Expo. One company that made
a statement was Airbiquity, which a booth located in the center of the show floor. The company, which provides cloud-based, connected-vehi- cle services, announced it is now the official solution for Nissan, starting with the 2014 Altima. This makes Nissan the first automotive brand to introduce connected car tech- nology using a single connect- ed vehicle services platform. “We see ourselves at the center of the telematics ecosystem,” said Scott Frank,
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