q&a How strongly will the in-car infrastructure mirror the
current app development market (third-party) in terms of allowing other companies to create apps for in-car systems? If so, are there guidelines in place or being developed? “That’s a tricky question. Ford’s approach to date is no third-
party applications on the head units. The only people putting applications on head units are Ford, and these are by specifically approved vendors. For example, in the current Gen2 system, we have a third-party mapping system. We tested, approved and implemented it. Even though it’s not ours, it’s part of the pro- duction and engineering environment. In 2010 we created AppLink, and open-sourced it in 2013 calling it Smart Device Link (SDL). It’s software that wraps all of the head unit services, like buttons, dials, screens, text-to- speech, menus, the graphical elements on the screen, and we expose them to third parties using an API library. So compa- nies like Pandora, Spotify, MLB At Bat, or ESPN can take their app and incorporate it into this library so they can have access and control these particular assets. So we’ll give a third party developer access that is secure and confined. The third-party applications are not on our head unit; only authorized software will be displayed on our head unit. There’s too much liability and too much concern for safety. At the end of the day we’re very conscious of the safety issue.”
What is the ratio of interaction between touch and voice control? How advanced is your voice-activated navigation and what are some of the features of that system? “When we talk about AppLink, we make available all services on the head unit, which include text-to-speech. How much voice technology that’s actually invoked is really up to the developer. If a third party doesn’t want to use a feature, they don’t have to. We (Ford) have a developer program at
developer.ford.com where we train and talk to developers about best practices and explain what will be tested if the developer says they want to release something to the public. If they choose to never build this, the likelihood of their product ever being released into the market is low. Ford firmly believes the best and most underuti- lized interface is the voice. In the last two to three years, we released a product called
Emergency Assist where the vehicle head unit has a number of logic elements that help it determine if there is data indicating a crash. Once we put them into our primary algorithm and deter- mine with accuracy that there has been a crash we will place an immediate 911 call using the paired phone. The car speaks to you saying a crash has been determined and will automati- cally call 911. You can press stop or say ‘no’ if you don’t want the call to be made. When an accident is detected, a message is sent to emergency services and reports the vehicle’s location within
16 Mobile Electronics August 2014
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