Smart Car Technologies coming soon in future

For a long time, the sole purpose of a car was to take us from point A to point B as fast as traffic conditions would allow us to. However, rapid advancements in technology has led to a surge in demand from many of us – we want to have more comfort, entertainment, functionalities, and so on in our cars than ever before.

Just like how phones have evolved into smartphones, perhaps cars should also take a similar route and evolve into ‘smart’ cars equipped with futuristic and (more importantly) practical features. In fact, some car manufacturers have already implemented a few of these things are about to mention, but it’ll be nice to see them become standard features in all cars of the future.

Enhanced Gesture Control

Building on the familiar existing technology of knob and voice controls, Audi, in 2011, introduced a new feature that would provide unprecendented ease in controlling a car’s functions. The new feature is called MMI touch, and is actually an enhancement for their already exisiting Audi Multi Media Interface (MMI) system.

The best thing about MMI touch is that it enables drivers to input characters just by using a finger to “write” on the designated touchpad. This has a wide range of applications such as keying in addresses for navigation purposes, entering phone numbers or simply selecting songs to play. MMI touch also has support for a range of languages besides English.

Augmented Reality Head-Up Display

Having augmented reality display on a car windscreen would add a lot of functionality to the car. We would be able to see information like speed, navigation details and even the name of an incoming call with minimalistic designs on our windscreens.

By using an app called HUDWAY, you can place your iPhone on the dashboard of your car and navigation information (from your iPhone) will be reflected and displayed on your windscreen. It looks very cool but obviously doesn’t work under certain conditions, e.g. when the surrounding is too bright for the information to be clearly visibile on your windscreen.

Head-up displays are definitely something of the future that we should look forward to. It’ll help us keep our eyes on the road by giving us all the relevant information without having to look at a center console display or our smartphones.

Apps & Firmware Updates

Imagine driving a car capable of running apps that are no less powerful than what you have on your smartphone right now. For starters, there can be specialized apps for certain countries or cities that could provide local information on restaurants, malls or other places of interest for travelers.

Toyota has already introduced a concept car called Fun Vii Concept Car that can do all of the above and more. “Vii” is an acronym for Vehicle, Interactive, Internet – this concept car basically allows the driver to be constantly connected with everyone including your friends and even other automobiles. What’s more, its exterior design can even be customized as shown in this short promotional clip.

While it will probably take some time before cars like Fun Vii get to production, cars with the ability to have firmware updates have already been made available on the market. These firmware updates could improve certain features of the car including the radio, tire pressure, Wi-Fi connectivity, and charging capacity. Tesla Model S, a 100% electric car, is one car that has such firmware updates.

Sheet Thin Batteries

As batteries used in existing electric cars are bulky and heavy, manufacturers have to find a suitable place to put the large amount of batteries, and at the same time, ensure that the car is well balanced throughout. What will be really cool is to have batteries hidden in plain sight by replacing the cosmetic parts of a car.

These parts could be the panels throughout the car on both the interior and exterior. Manufacturers won’t have to compromise on the appearance of the car as the batteries would be thin and bendable. Although technology has yet to catch up with this vision, it’s definitely something worth looking forward to.

Communication Between Vehicles

Communication between vehicles doesn’t mean you can call up the car in front of you and ask it to move out of your way. It’s more like machines communicating with each other so that there’ll be smoother traffic and less congested roads.

This technology will also increase road safety by reducing collisions between cars. For example, your car can warn you about a car that’s coming from your blind spot. If implemented correctly, this technology will significantly increase road safety, efficiency, and driving experience.

Smart Fuel Saving Tips

Another cool feature to have in a ‘smart’ car is to have it give you fuel efficiency tips or notifications while you’re driving. For example, it can notify you about a nearby gas station that has cheap gas prices; so even if you still have half a tank of fuel left, it’ll suggest that you refill now to avoid paying more at another gas station when you eventually run out of fuel.

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Perfect Integration With Smartphones

Something that is obviously lacking in contemporary cars is integration with smartphones. We’re not talking about being able to play music off your smartphone but more of being able to control your smartphone’s functionality through voice commands or even buttons on the steering wheel.

Honda is taking a pioneering step by integrating Apple’s Siri Eyes Free into their upcoming car models. That would basically allow you to use iOS from the dashboard of your car, letting you easily and safely make phone calls, access music, send and receive messages, and get directions using built-in Apple apps.

Meanwhile, there isn’t that much going on as far as integrating Android into cars is concerned. Although Android users can get lots of functionality (Google Now, Maps) just by mounting their Android smartphones onto their car windscreens, it’ll definitely be nice to have an integrated system with the car dashboard that allows the use of buttons on the steering wheel.

 Long Term Evolution (LTE)

As some of you may know, built-in GPS devices (in cars) work without needing Internet access. But wouldn’t it be great if we can get live traffic updates on top of the usual GPS navigation? To do that, however, an Internet connection would be required – something that many cars still don’t have support for.

Here’s the good news: some car manufacturers like Audi have already made plans to implement Long Term Evolution (LTE) in their future car models. LTE would allow for better quality internet radio, searching for a location using pictures and faster loading of live maps. Having a dedicated LTE connection in a car can also turn the car into a Wi-Fi hotspot for people on laptops who are constantly on the go.

Self-Healing Paint

Self-healing paint has been around for some time now, but somehow hasn’t been implemented in consumer cars yet. Whatever the case may be, this is one cool technology – surface scratches will magically disappear after just a few minutes and your car will look like how it once was.

(Image Source: Nissan)

Truth be told, deep scratches won’t be 100% gone and some may still be visible if you look hard enough, but from a distance the car will still look as good as new.

Final Thoughts

Technological advancements have certainly surpassed our expectations of what can be integrated into cars. However, some of these advanced features we have looked at may come with hefty price tags. Nonetheless, we can still hope for a time where technology becomes more efficient and cheaper, allowing for all these cool and futuristic features to be implemented in cars of every price range.

A Brief History of the Car Radio and Telematics Systems

Car Radio

Mono AM Radio to Touchscreen Infotainment: Nine Decades of Automotive Head Units

Car audio has been a popular hobby and obsession since the early days of both cars and radios, and the head unit has evolved a lot throughout the years. They’ve gone from simple, monaural AM radios to complicated infotainment systems, and a number of technologies have come and gone over the intervening decades.

Most head units still include an AM tuner, but eight-track tapes, cassettes, and other technologies have faded into history. Other technologies, such as the compact disc, could also disappear over the next few years. That might seem far fetched, but the history of car radios is littered with abandoned technology that was once considered state of the art.

The First Commercial Head Units

1930s

• first car radios

Enthusiasts had already been finding creative ways to integrate radios into their cars for over a decade, but the first true car radios weren’t introduced until the 1930s. Motorola offered one of the first car radios, which retailed for about $130. Philco also introduced an early head unit around that time.

When inflation is taken into account, $130 translates to a price tag of about $1,800. Keep in mind that this was the era of the Model T, and you could buy an entire car for around two to three times the asking price of Motorola’s first car radio.

AM Continues to Dominate

1950s

• FM Receivers
• record players

Head units dropped in price and increased in quality over the intervening years, but they were still only capable of receiving AM broadcasts until the 1950s. That made sense because AM stations held a stranglehold on the market share at that point. That might seem strange from a modern perspective, but there was a time when FM radio wasn’t exactly a popular medium.

Blaupunkt sold the first AM/FM head unit in 1952, but it took a few decades for FM to really catch on.

The first on-demand music system also appeared in the 1950s. At that point we were still almost a decade away from eight tracks, and records were the dominant force in home audio. Record players aren’t exactly the most shock-proof media ever invented, but that didn’t stop Chrysler. Despite all common sense, Mopar introduced the very first record playing head unit in 1955.

The Car Stereo is Born

1960s

• first eight track
• first stereo

The 1960s saw the introduction of both eight-tracks tapes and car stereos to the world. Up until that point, all car radios had used a single audio channel. Some had speakers in both the front and the back that could be adjusted separately, but they still only had one audio channel.

Early “stereos” placed one channel on the front speakers and the other on the rear speakers, but systems that used the modern left and right format appeared soon after.

The eight track format actually owes a lot to car head units. If it wasn’t for car audio, the entire format probably would have floundered. Ford pushed it pretty hard, though, and all of the other OEMs eventually picked up the format in order to compete.

Compact Cassettes Arrive on the Scene

1970s

• first cassette tape head unit

The eight-track tape’s days were numbered from the start, and the format was rapidly pushed out of the marketplace by the compact cassette. The first cassette head units showed up in the 1970s, and the format was substantially longer-lived than its immediate predecessor.

The first cassette deck head units were relatively hard on tapes, and Maxell actually based an ad campaign in the early 1980s on the concept that its tapes were hardy enough to stand up to the abuse. Everyone who ever put a cassette into an in-dash tape deck remembers the sinking feeling associated with the head unit “eating” a precious tape.

The Compact Disc Fails to Dislodge the Compact Cassette

• first CD head units

The first CD head units showed up less than 10 years after the first tape decks, but adoption of the technology was much slower. CD players wouldn’t become ubiquitous in head units until the late 1990s, and the technology coexisted with the compact cassette for more than two decades.

CD Players Become Dominant

1990s

• Video head units
• CD-RW compatible head units

CD players became increasingly popular in head units during the 1990s, and there were a few notable additions toward the tail end of the decade. Head units that were capable of reading CD-RWs and playing MP3 files became available, and DVD functionality also appeared in some high end vehicles and aftermarket head units.

Bluetooth and Infotainment Systems

2000s

• Bluetooth
• HDD-based head units
• Infotainment systems

During the first decade of the 21st century, head units gained the ability to interface with phones and other devices via Bluetooth. This technology was actually developed in 1994, but it was originally intended as a replacement for wired networks. In automotive applications, the technology allowed for hands-free calling and created a situation where a head unit could automatically mute itself during a phone conversation.

The accuracy of consumer GPS systems also increased during the first part of the decade, which led to an explosion in both OEM and aftermarket navigation systems. The first infotainment systems also started to appear, and some head units even offered built-in HDD storage.

The Death of the Cassette and What Comes Next

2010s

• The last OEM cassette deck
• Cloud-based music players
• Internet radio

2011 marked the first year that the OEMs stopped offering cassette decks in new cars. The last car to roll off the line with an OEM cassette player was a 2010 Lexus SC 430. After about 30 years of service, the format was finally retired to make way for new technologies.

According to some reports, the CD player could be the next one on the chopping block before much longer. Several OEMs stopped offering CD changers after the 2012 model year, and in-dash CD players could potentially follow suit. So what comes next?

The most obvious candidate to replace CD players are HDD-based music players, but an Internet connection removes the need for physical storage altogether. Some head units are now capable of playing music from the cloud, and others can connect to Internet services like Pandora.

Telematics History And Future Predictions

A History Of Telematics and Where It Is Heading in the Future with New Technology

Throughout the years we have witnessed a marriage of informatics and telecommunications to create telematics. We have witnessed telematics accomplish everything from improving health care quality to reducing the environmental impact of vehicles. It has revolutionized many aspects of our world, such as changing the way hospital patients are diagnosed, and lowering ordinary peoples insurance premiums.

Telematics is all about being able to get information on vehicles. Everything from fuel performance to driving speed can be tracked with telematics. The beginning of telematics could be said to have started with a tachnograph over 60 years a go. To understand Telematics you have to understand GPS, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_Positioning_System

Without GPS there would not be the telematics we know today. GPS is a system that was designed for navigation and positioning. It was developed by the US defence department which knew of the importance of exact data on the positions of its assets. It was developed to fulfil the pressing need to have increased communication and exact data on the battlefield. It used the satellite network in cohesion with ground communication.

Dozens of GPS satellites now orbit the earth and enable GPS receivers to find their exact location on the planet. GPS changed from a military application to a civilian one and the US government provided free basic GPS signals to anyone in the world. It pushed for the adoption of GPS around the world and made agreements with Japan and the EU.

GPS that exists today is still under the control of the US military. It has become an indispensable tool for services all around the world. GPS basically works through a network of satellites that cross reference your signals location on the ground to the satellites location in space. By trialaterating these positions and accounting for the difference in time for the signals to be sent back and forth, you can get an exact position of your location. You use at least three satellites to determine your GPS location.

Trilateration works by calculating the relative location of different satellites by using known reference points to calculate the position of an unknown reference point.

So what exactly is the big difference between telematics and GPS? Well what telematics does is it picks up where GPS left off. It uses GPS technology to offer many different services to car owners such as navigation services. GPS just provides data about your location where as telematics analyzes and uses information along with communicating with parties outside of your vehicle. This enables a huge range of services to be offered through telematics.

The essence pieces of the telematics puzzle all converged in the 1990’s with GPS, GSM and the internet merging as one. This enabled automobiles to enter a new era of connectivity.

A lot of the development in Telematics began back in the 1984 European Parliamentary resolution to promote road safety.

Studies throughout the 1980’s kept tabs on informatics and the development of telecommunications to find new applications for road safety. Through these studies a program known as DRIVE was started to conduct research.

This community based research program focused on finding ways of using telematics for road safety, greater levels of efficiency, and reducing environmental impact.

The DRIVE program was concluded in 1992 while in 1990 another program began for telematics in general. In 1993 a European treaty was signed for telematics at the EU. The treaty enabled more research and development along with increasing telematic firms competitiveness on a global scale.

In 1993 the EU decided to increase its global competitiveness through stronger logistics networks and transportation. The digital revolution that was beginning and leaders believed that through telematics they could ride at the wave to economic success. Information and technology was seen as a key factor to being more competitive.

Telematics research was heavily promoted in the government as a way to improve traffic management and harmonizing traffic through the European Union. Pilot projects were set up to ensure the technical capability of the telematics technology to be used for this new vision.

Their vision included a more efficient Europe with safer transportation and better integration in a diverse transportation system.

Here is an overview of some key technological innovations that have occurred in telematics during the last decade:

1998 – The first hands free car gateways were introduced

2000 – The first GSM & GPS systems were brought to market

2002 – Bluetooth hand free voice gateways with advanced voice integration features

2003 – Integrated GSM phone with Bluetooth

2007 – Multimedia handset integration is introduced

2009 – Fully integrated mobile navigation using a car GSM system

2010 – 3G multimedia car entertainment system

2011 – Telematics and Infotainment systems introduced based on Linux

Where Telematics Is Headed In The Future

Several new innovations in telematics are causing exciting new advertising applications for in car entertainment that will ultimately lead to lower costs for the consumer. Navigation will become increasingly lower cost, with greater communication occurring between vehicles on the road, and a trend towards eco friendly.

Navigation systems are becoming increasingly popular as more drivers are realizing the benefits it offers, and new features are being added every year. The services available through telematic devices will separate more and more into two different categories:

Free
Premium

This is going to increase the number of options available to consumers, especially as android based telematic systems become more widely distributed.

Increased Personalization

You will be able to personalize and customize your telematic systems at an increasingly popular level. Soon you will see telematic systems merging together, with your ability to have a telematic black box and a android based entertainment system together in one unit.

Car providers are also offering more possibilities for application development. The previous model was based on manufacturers developing applications and then providing them to the user. Now car manufacturers are listening to the consumer more and focusing on following software industry leaders like Apple and Google.

Greater Interactivity

New touch based systems are more sensitive than ever and offer greater opportunities for user input. From voice control to new options like heat sensitive screens, and camera tracking of user motions. You may one day be able to control half your car by waving your finger in the air, as new technology makes it easier than ever for greater control.

Community

You will observe more community and greater connectivity between in car users, as the speeds and services of Telematics becomes proliferated. This means that you may be able to connect with other drivers on the road, social network, and even develop virtual car pooling to help save on gas.

Greater Openness

You will see the telematic systems moving from closed manufacturer software to open software with universal standards. Instead of manufacturers trying to each develop their own proprietary systems, Telematics will become increasingly standardized and cross compatible between vehicle models and manufacturers.

This will lead to more applications and services being available to Telematic customers as a whole, in addition to greater flexibility when you change car models.

Easier To Use

Ease of use ranks as the most important feature for car users, so developers are trying to make the systems increasingly user friendly for drivers. This includes better voice recognition and control technology, more features, applications designed for drivers, and a simpler interface that is more intuitive.

In a word, we can see telematics becoming more like Apple products.

More Telematic Feedback

Your telematic system will be increasingly capable of providing you with information and feedback while you are on the road. There are many new exciting developments underway such as:

> Post secondary learning from your vehicle

> EBooks being read aloud while you are driving

> Having your favorite newspapers read

> Feedback on your driving

> Feedback on road conditions

> Warnings and updates about traffic

Emphasis on Infotainment

One of the big growth areas right now and for the foreseeable future of telematics is the information entertainment models. These models are capable of providing drivers with a wide range of digital entertainment services. In the future we will see many exciting new possibilities such as:

> Pay Per View Movies

> Television subscriptions

> In car games for passengers

> Vehicle based games

> Cloud syncing with your music files

> Digitally access your computer in your office or home

For many people the road can be a boring place if you are stuck in rush hour traffic or on a long journey. Perhaps you are just waiting for someone and need to kill time. Automakers see a huge potential to keep their users from getting bored by offering new entertainment options while they are in the vehicle.

More Local Information

With the power of the internet and GPS your vehicle will be able to dynamically provide new information on wherever you go. You will be able to program your vehicle to notify you when you are near your favorite fast food joint, or if there is a location of interest close to your vehicle.

Everything from where the library is to the hippest restaurant in town can be brought up instantly as your driving. Imagine you are in a new city on business and feel hungry, so your car searches the internet, and recommends several different restaurants within 10 minutes of your location.

Here is another scenario, you are with your kids and want to find some where to stop to let them relax. You instruct your car to pull up  and your application automatically finds the best places to take your kids within a 10 minute drive from your current location.

Safer Vehicles

Telematics is also leading to better road intelligence that is enabling both governments and drivers to make the road safer. There are several exciting new innovations such as:

> Analysis of statistical “black spots” that are dangerous for drivers and early warnings to slow down before you arrive

> Better data for local governments to make safer roads and adjust traffic systems to fit user demand

It is also encouraging users to drive safer by providing real time feedback on your driving. This is estimated to make the roads safer as a whole as drivers are corrected in real time for reckless driving.

Your vehicle will also be able to better adjust to road conditions when its data tells it that rain is coming up ahead. Your brakes, wheel sensitivity and more can all be adjusted to suit rainy conditions just before you arrive in the rainy location. This makes you safer while driving.

More Sophisticated Insurance

Telematics is estimated to become increasingly important to insurance providers as more users are expected to switch over to black box insurance. The types of insurance premiums offered through telematics will become increasingly sophisticated and differentiated.

For example we will see a change in telematics insurance options, you will no longer have to pick a single telematics insurance policy from your favorite provider. Instead you will have a wide range of new options such as basing your policy upon the number of miles you drive. You will be able to add on additional features such as extra country or mountainous miles which are more dangerous than city miles.

You will be able to pick specific policies catered to those who are in rush hour traffic everyday, and specialized policies that are for outdoor lovers. New telematics policies may take into account the year, condition, and make of your vehicle while assessing your driving and the road conditions you go on.

It is possible that future telematics insurance policies may offer you discounts for driving on country roads with a vehicle that is better suited for them. Or purchasing an extra safe vehicle could lead to lower costs even with a black box policy.

New options and choices will be important considerations for the conscious consumer as the insurance policies become more popular.

Ultimately telematics came out of the birth of GPS and is now enabling drivers everywhere to drive safer, more conveniently, and more intelligently. You are able to have greater entertainment, and be more productive on the road with the new innovations in telematics technology.

Tata Motors and Microsoft tie up for infotainment tech in new cars

The Futuro that would be unveiled at the 87th Geneva International Motor Show, the new sportscar from Tamo, Tata’s new performance sub-brand may feature the Microsft Azure cloud computing technology

Tata Motors today announced the strategic tie-up with Microsoft for implementation of their cloud computing and other technologies in their passenger vehicle segment. The first unveil of this vehicle will happen at the 87th Geneva International Motor Show on 7th March, 2017. The company had recently announced the unveil of their first sports car, the Futuro on the same date at the same venue. This is a mild indication that the company would introduce this Rs 25 lakh sportscar with Microsoft enabled functionalities such as telematics, advanced navigation with real time traffic updates, predictive maintenance and remote monitoring features.

Although, there is no official statement from Tata Motors on this, but, considering the two products are being showcased on the same day, it is safe to assume that the Futuro would be the first car from Tata Motors featuring this technology. That said, Tamo “will act as an open platform to foster innovation through a startup ecosystem and develop vehicles with ‘on-the-go’ connectivity”, as per a recent press release. Adding Microsoft Azure to an affordable sportscar would mean that this technology would reach more customers without entailing a high initial cost.

The Azure is Microsoft’s cloud computing technology that recommends points-of-interest, route assist recommendations and shopping points etc based on a user’s location. Other features of the Azure include service reminders, updation of key vehicle settings remotely and many other features for a user on the move. Although the Azure technology was showcased at the Consumer Electronics Show 2017, a production-ready version is yet to be witnessed. The Futuro could be the one to showcase this technology and once in production, features aforementioned would enable users to have a proper digital eco-system in their cars thereby enabling the consumer to operate most of their functions as well as get all the information on a hand-held device.

The Futuro will be powered by the Revotron 1.2 litre engine, but, in this sports car, it will generate over 150 hp of power. In addition, the weight of the car will be around 700 kg which would result in an impressive power-to-weight ratio for a car that would cost Rs 25 lakh. This weight shedding would be courtesy of using aluminium and carbon fibre. Although, Tata would produce only 250 units of the vehicle, what is baffling is getting all this technology at an affordable price would be a challenge, knowing that this technology would also include Microsoft’s cloud platform which, in a limited production car, would cost relatively high.

There seems to be a different air running through the offices of Tata Motors these days. Off late, the company has been making multiple announcements related to future business and while this isn’t anything new from the company, the fact that these moves seem promising and impressive is a big change for the homegrown company. After the unveiling of TAMO, Tata Motors has now announced a partnership with Microsoft. Through the partnership, passengers will get access to an enhanced digital driving experience, wherein the technology will offer predictive maintenance, advanced navigation, remote monitoring of vehicle and over-the-air (OTA) updates.

First thing first, this system is very different from Apple’s CarPlay or Android Auto since those are focussed only on infotainment, while the Microsoft one gives information even regarding the vehicle and personal interests.

The company will make use of the connected vehicle technologies of Microsoft, which is a combination of artificial intelligence (AI), advanced machine learning, and the Internet of Things (IoT) capabilities on the global Azure cloud in one platform. Through this partnership, Tata Motors aims to establish a fully-connected ecosystem, which will improve the in-cabin experience of passengers by seamless connectivity with all their devices and information.

A key point to consider is that Tata Motors and Microsoft will continue to offer new updates for services and apps. This will allow occupants to always stay connected to their preferred choice of information. The best part is that the technology is being developed for deployment at affordable prices, which means it could soon trickle down into more of mainstream vehicles. The first model to be equipped with this technology will be unveiled at the Geneva Motor Show later this year. Since the TAMO Futuro too will be launched around the same time, there is a possibility that it could be the car to get this technology first.

What does it mean for the average Tata Motors consumer?

This is great news for all Tata Motors consumers as both the companies have made it clear that they intend to develop affordable systems for deployment in mass-market vehicles. While a TAMO vehicle will get the technology first, we expect regular cars from Tata Motors to be equipped with a scaled down version of the technology from as early as 2018.

In the longer run, this move could prove to be significantly beneficial for Tata Motors as younger buyers will continue to dominate the passenger vehicle market in the coming years. These buyers give huge importance connectivity as it’s an inseparable part of their lives. This is where Tata and Microsoft can potentially turn more consumers towards buying Tata products over the competition.

However, the actual results would depend on how successfully both companies are able to deliver the technology. Any delay in launch or trickling it to mass-market vehicles could give the competition enough time to improvise and offer better products. Microsoft is not the only company working on artificial intelligence and digital connectivity for the automotive sector and the competition is watching keenly!

 

Continental integrates Face and Fingerprint recognition in cars.

Fingerprint and facial recognition have become commonplace in smartphones and computers, but now a car manufacturer is looking to include the technology in its vehicles.

An interior camera will be able to scan the driver’s face and offer vehicle personalization, like adjustments of the seat and mirrors, music, temperature and navigation.

The fingerprint recognition would be used to add an additional layer of security. Using two-factor authentication, the driver would need to have the key fob and be able to confirm their identity via the fingerprint sensor.

The cars will use face and finger print recognition.

The cars are getting more and more intelligent day by day which is the reason that many car makers are introducing new techniques to make them more secure and more personalized.

Continental is going to introduce the new intelligence of the time that will now be included in cars. The technology will be introduced in CES 2017 by Continental motors.

The company is using a number of technologies in order to make sure that the customers get the best experience. They are going to introduce a keyless entry system and start system (PASE) which is known as Passive Start and Entry. Another important component will be biometrics elements.

“The integration of biometric elements brings our expertise in systems integration to the forefront, as we are linking our access control solution with other intelligent systems in vehicles to ensure increased comfort and safety for all passengers,” said Michael Crane, head of Continental’s Body & Security business unit, North America.

“In addition, the access systems allow us to only control specific components as needed. This means that components are not required to operate continuously, which saves energy and increases efficiency.”

The technology will make sure that the owners of cars find new possibilities and horizons in the field of personalization of cars. The cars will become customized and totally personalized like that of a smartphone of this era with this kind of activity.

Authentication through fingerprint recognition has made its way into personal electronics and even household door locks, but is not yet available in cars. The automotive industry, so far, has relied on radio frequency signals from key fobs for car access and vehicle start security.

The fingerprint scanning will make sure that the car of an individual gets authentically personalized. The finger print controlling will control engine starting. This can be a great step in ensuring securing of vehicles in the automotive industry.

The biometric component will mean that the person will have to make sure that the finger print is required before starting the car through the key. The key alone won’t be sufficient for the rider to take the car anywhere.

 

Rather than do away with key fobs, Continental suggests in a press release that automakers might want to use its fingerprint technology to create another layer of security. A driver would need to have her fingerprint registered with the car and have the key fob present to start the engine. That scenario, however, does not take into account valet service or the quick loan of a car to a friend.

The system will also be connected to an internal camera that will make sure that the system of car is personalized according to the customized settings of the person sitting in the car. For example the camera will recognize the user and will formulate the settings of music, temperature, mirror position and other settings according to their choice.

For facial recognition, an internal camera scans the driver to match her face with a known profile. Continental suggests that facial recognition would work well for personalizing the car’s electronics.

 

Common module family(CMF)

Common Module Family or CMF is the Alliance’s unique modular architecture system. CMF allows the company to build a wide range of vehicles from a smaller pool of parts, resulting in more savings and greater value for customers.

 

The Common Module Family (CMF) is a modular architecture concept jointly developed by car manufacturers Nissan and Renault through their Renault–Nissan Alliance partnership.The concept covers a wide range of vehicle platforms

Automotive Security Review Board

“By 2020 there will be no deaths from accidents in any of their cars,” because of connectedness and smart automotive subsystems, or so claims a car manufacturer.

 

Innovation in next-generation cars By advancing network connectivity in cars, the industry has enabled innovative functions, some of which are already available. These new functions are often referred to as “cyberphysical” features, since almost all of them require collecting data from the physical environment and cybersystems, making automotive operation decisions, and executing on such decisions with physical consequences. Some of these innovations include:

■ Advanced driver assistant systems (ADAS): Smart lighting control, adaptive cruise control, collision avoidance, driver fatigue detection, lane departure warning, and parking assist.

■ Advanced fleet management: Usage and behavior monitoring, warranty restrictions by zone, real-time telematics, and package tracking.

■ Smart transportation: Traffic congestion, vehicle sharing, and fuel efficiency are influencing existing operating modes and creating new ones. Vehicle-to-infrastructure and vehicle-to-vehicle communications, such as smart intersections, traffic light control, road trains, and traffic management, are key contributors to smart city operations.

■ Autonomous driving: The ultimate goal of the next generation of vehicles is that driverless cars become a reality to achieve zero fatalities and/or collisions, improved traffic flow, and other benefits, with early examples already visible from Daimler, Ford, Google, Tesla, and others. Automotive innovation is driving the need for built-in security solutions and architectural design to mitigate emerging threats. The goal for automotive security products is to ensure that the new vehicle paradigm is protected and can operate to its full potential, even in a malicious operating environment.

Automotive innovation is driving the need for built-in security solutions and architectural design to mitigate emerging threats. The goal for automotive security products is to ensure that the new vehicle paradigm is protected and can operate to its full potential, even in a malicious operating environment

Distributed security architecture Automotive computer security is a collaborative approach of defenses to detect, protect, and correct identifiable or avoidable threats and to protect from previously unknown or unavoidable ones. With next-generation cars, these layers include hardware-based protection in and around the ECUs, software-based in-vehicle defenses, network monitoring and enforcement inside and outside the vehicle, cloud security services, and appropriate data privacy and anonymity for bumper-to-cloud protection. The key tenets of data privacy and anonymity must be safeguarded while ensuring the security of the automobile. Users must also be educated about secure usage of the systems and potential threats. For example, if they sync their phones to a rental or shared vehicle, which may copy all of their contacts and location data, they must remember to disconnect and delete the data when they return their cars. Security defense-in-depth consists of three layers: hardware security modules, hardware services, and software security services. Hardware security protects the ECU as a security enabler and enforcer. Its primary responsibilities are: secure boot to bring the environment to the initial trusted state, secure storage of keys, and a trusted execution environment. Hardware security services build on top of hardware security and provide fast cryptographic performance, immutable device identification, message authentication, and execution isolation. Software security services enhance security capabilities on top of the hardware with network enforcement, whitelists/blacklists, anomaly detection, cryptographic services, biometrics, secure over-the-air updates, and upgrade capabilities, all delivered over the life of the car.

Hardware security

Hardware security systems are like the physical protection systems on a car—the engine firewall, seatbelts, and airbags. They are there to protect the operating components from intentional or accidental damage. There is a wide range of hardware security building blocks available from the computer security industry that help secure the ECUs and buses. These include:

■ Secure boot and software attestation functions: Detects tampering with boot loaders and critical operating system files by checking their digital signatures and product keys. Invalid files are blocked from running before they can attack or infect the system, giving an ECU its trust foundation when operating.

■ Trusted execution technology, such as the trusted processor module: Uses cryptographic techniques to create a unique identifier for each approved component, enabling an accurate comparison of the elements of a startup environment against a known good source and arresting the launch of code that does not match.

■ Tamper protection: Encrypts encryption keys, intellectual property, account credentials, and other valuable information at compile time and decrypts only during a small execution window, protecting the information from reverse engineering and monitoring for tampering attempts.

■ Cryptographic acceleration: Offloads encryption workloads to optimized hardware, improving cryptographic performance and making it easier to broadly incorporate symmetric or public key encryption into applications and communications processes.

■ Active memory protection: Reduces code vulnerabilities by embedding pointerchecking functionality into hardware to prevent buffer overflow conditions that may be exploited by malicious code.

■ Device identity directly on the device: Enables manufacturers to know the unique identity of every device, enabling secure identification and preventing unapproved devices from accessing the manufacturer’s network or systems. Technologies such as Intel EPID (Enhanced Privacy ID), which may be built into processors from Intel and others, also protects anonymity by allowing devices to be verified as part of a group instead of by their unique identity

Software security

■ Secure boot: Works with the hardware to ensure that the loaded software components are valid to provide a root of trust for the rest of the system.

■ Partitioned operating systems: A commonly used software and hardware combination that isolates different processes or functions, such as externally facing functions from those that drive the vehicle, reducing the complexity of consolidating multiple systems onto a single ECU. Techniques, including virtualization and software containers, make it possible to update or replace individual functions without affecting overall operation, or mirror functions for redundancy and fast fail-over.

■ Authentication: Authentication by a physical key for unlocking doors and starting the engine is no longer sufficient and is being augmented by software, as cars offer personalized services across multiple functions and profiles. Electronic keys, passwords, and biometrics need to be managed and authorized to access personal information, such as identity, telemetry, locations, and financial transactions. Similarly, the various ECUs in a vehicle need to authenticate communication to prevent an attacker from faking messages or commands.

■ Enforcement of approved and appropriate behavior: It is very common for cyberattacks to try to jump from one system to another or send messages from a compromised component to an uncompromised one. Preventing this network activity is a key to detecting and correcting accidental or malicious threats. These functions can also prevent multicar attacks on an entire series of cars or snowball effects from cascading error propagation.

Network security

■ Message and device authentication: Verifies that communications are coming from an approved source and protects authentications from being spoofed or recorded and replayed.

■ Enforcement of predictably holistic behavior of all systems: Restricts network communications to predefined normal behavior and constrains abnormal types or volumes of messages so that they do not impair the vehicle’s functions.

■ Access controls: Explicitly permit communications and messages only between pre-approved systems and sensors, block unapproved and inappropriate messages, and alert security systems about any invalid attempts. Manufacturers, maintenance organizations, owners, drivers, and even police and insurance companies will have different access rights to the car’s information systems that need to be authorized and controlled. Cloud security services While embedded vehicle security is essential, some additional security services require real-time intelligence and updates, so the systems need to be able to connect to cloud-based security services in order to detect and correct threats before they get to the car. These include:

■ Secure authenticated channel to the cloud: Leverages hardware-assisted cryptography for remote monitoring, software updates, and other communications. Data protection technology secures data throughout the transaction.

■ Remote monitoring of vehicle activity: Includes appropriate privacy constraints to help detect anomalous behavior and misbehaving vehicles and filter out and remove malware.

■ Threat intelligence exchanges: Collaboration among dealers, manufacturers, and government agencies to quickly propagate warnings and remediation of zero-day exploits and new malware to the vehicle, containing the spread of an attack and retroactively identifying and correcting previously infected ones.

■ Over-the-air updates: Used for firmware (FOTA) and software (SOTA) updates and work well for smartphones and other consumer and business electronics. With appropriate user controls and safety precautions, these are vital to get systems updated quickly when a breach or vulnerability is discovered and substantially reduce the cost of recalls.

■ Credential management: The online component of vehicle, owner, and driver authentication, providing easy and secure management of user profiles and account information, federated identities, and associated cryptographic keys and services. Security of credentials is critical to data privacy.

 

@ Info credits tomshardware

 

The Real Car Technology of Tomorrow: Fast forward 2020

Things can change dramatically in the span of a decade. If you’re reading this, you likely have access to the internet (or at least a generous friend with a printer). The same might not have been true in the year 2000. Since then, web access has made it to our pockets and our cars. Ten years ago, talking to your car was a sign you had a screw loose, airbags were not purchased by the dozen, and electric cars were found in large quantities only on carnival midways and golf courses. Cars are certainly changing, and the rate of that change will only increase over the next decade.

STAYING CONNECTED

For better or worse, the internet and cars will be inextricably linked in the future. Whereas some see this as more potential for distraction, the tweeters and the texters are going to win out on this one. As cellular data speeds increase, so will the speed of in-car internet (and the potential for accidents). This improved access does have its advantages, though; GPS map data will be more accurate and include richer accompanying info that’s actually up-to-date. The kids will have a never-ending supply of YouTube videos to watch on the way to Grandma’s (good luck getting them out of the car). And, you know, you’ll be able to more easily check Facebook from the road. So that’s good.

USB and Cellular Updates

Aside from just accessing the web, though, your car will be able to better sync with your computers and mobile devices. The address book that lives on your desktop will appear on your car’s infotainment computer. Now that more and more infotainment systems include USB ports, the in-car systems will be easy to update when new software becomes available, which should make syncing with the latest smartphones possible. Updates may also be sent over the air, making use of your cell phone’s data connection or taking advantage of the cell radios already fitted to vehicles with telematics systems such as GM’s OnStar or Mercedes-Benz’s Tele Aid.

Holographic Info Displays

With all this information flowing through our cars, data displays will become even more important. We know that Audi and a couple other manufacturers are working on holographic-style head-up displays. (Obi-Wan would be proud.) These color images will be projected in front of the driver and be most useful for things like 3-D maps and driving directions. We can get behind anything that has the ability to keep more eyes on the road. More use of digital gauges, in-dash displays, and larger touchscreens is also a given.

Car-to-X Communication

Cars themselves will stay more connected—to one another and to the road infrastructure. Called “car-to-X communication,” these systems are being tested by several companies and allow vehicles to communicate with stop lights, report traffic to the grid, and warn other vehicles of accidents. This increased awareness has the potential to save fuel, time, and lives. There are some inherent privacy issues here, but we think the Twitter Nation has already blindly given up that right.

STAYING SAFE

Speaking of technology with the potential to keep us safer, we see even more bits and bytes being devoted to the task of keeping us on the road. This goes beyond soon-to-be-mandated stability control and traction control, although those systems only stand to be improved over time.

Proliferation of Advanced Cruise Control

Laser- or radar-guided stop-and-go cruise control is already commonplace among luxury automakers, and we expect these systems to be offered on all but the least expensive vehicles in the future. Although this kind of tech is billed as a safety feature, a car that can prevent tailgating or stop itself without human intervention is likely to encourage and reinforce bad driving habits. Autopilot can’t be far behind.

More Lane Nannies

Two more silly driver aids, blind-spot monitors and lane-departure-warning systems, will also get a shot in the arm. A new system from Infiniti, set to debut on the 2011 M, combines the two. It will not only steer your car back into its lane when you wander but will also try to keep you from moving into the next lane when it’s occupied by another vehicle. Don’t think Infiniti will be the only manufacturer to utilize this technology. (Our favorite tech of this type? The driver’s eyes and neck.)

Spread of 360-Degree Cameras

As the way a car looks becomes more important than actually being able to see out of said car, cameras are becoming a necessary technological evil. Gone are the days when you could actually look over your shoulder and back out of a parking spot—and let’s face it, you’re too busy texting—so now we get neat overhead views stitched together by a computer and four camera feeds. The video-game set will have no problem acing the parking segment of the driving test of the future. That is, if everything doesn’t have automated parking systems by then, such as those already available from BMW, Ford, and Lexus/Toyota.

Night Vision Goes Mainstream

Another use of cameras is night vision, also the province of the luxobarges. BMW’s current system uses infrared and displays a heat-based, gray-scale image, and Mercedes’ amplifies available light. Toyota is now working on a color night-vision setup, using research into how nocturnal dung beetles see in low-light situations. Honestly, we couldn’t make this stuff up.

Airbags Go Where They’ve Never Gone Before

And just when you thought there were no more nooks or crannies in which to cram airbags comes news of the seatbelt airbag. The idea is to inflate the belt, spreading the force experienced during a collision over a larger area and helping keep you in place during an accident. Ford has announced it will debut such a device on the rear seatbelts of the 2011 Explorer, and this technology is sure to spread to many other vehicles.

STAYING EFFICIENT

If there’s one thing we know from working for a conglomerate, it’s how to synergize our efficiencies. We don’t know what that means, mind you, but it’s a safe bet that automakers—big and small—do and that they’re going to help us save more fuel and move to other sources of propulsion as the decade progresses. We’re already seeing it; electric cars of some flavor or another have been announced or at least promised by most manufacturers, and every auto show brings more hybrids to the table.

Battery Charging through the Air

With the imminent (or maybe not so imminent) proliferation of plug-in vehicles will come the need to easily charge batteries. Sure, you could pull into a spot and stick a clunky plug into the car’s charge port, but what’s futuristic about that? Inductive charging may be the convenient—and cool—answer. Already being applied on a small scale to handheld electronics like iPods and cell phones, this allows for charging sans wires, instead employing an electromagnetic field to pass the power. So when the day comes that you arrive home in your electric car, charging it might entail no more than parking over a mat embedded in or placed on the garage floor.

Stop/Start Systems Immigrate

For vehicles still saddled with internal-combustion engines, stop/start ignition will see wider use to save fuel. These systems shut down a vehicle’s engine when stopped and are already available across Europe and employed in most hybrids, but their adoption in the U.S. has been stymied due to automakers seeing a negligible effect from them during EPA fuel-economy testing. The real-world advantage is far from negligible, however, and as the price of the hardware goes down, we expect to hear—or not—more silent intersections. As an added bonus, systems that can talk to traffic lights via car-to-X tech will be better able to judge whether or not shutting down the engine will be advantageous, depending on when the light is going to change.

Aerodynamics Go Active

We’re also seeing a greater emphasis on aerodynamics, enabled by better computer modeling and more wind-tunnel time. Active aero is the next step, which involves things like powered shutters for radiator grilles, as seen on many current BMWs in Europe. The Ferrari 458 Italia even has deformable slats in its front air ducts. Controlling and metering airflow so the vehicle is cheating the wind as much as possible will result in significant fuel-saving benefits.

Even More Use of Advanced Materials

With all this tech comes more stuff, sending the already bloated weights of modern cars higher. That’s where new lightweight materials come into play. Audi has already showed us how downsizing engines and lightening its vehicles will help fuel economy—at a cost, of course. Not only will more lightweight materials like aluminum, magnesium, and carbon fiber be used to construct the chassis and body, but weight-saving materials will see wider use in the cabin, as well. Thinner seat shells reduce weight and have the added benefit of increasing effective interior volume. New lighter and thinner composites will also reduce the mass of interior parts. Such weight savings will be imperative with batteried vehicles, the heaviest of the bunch coming down the line in the near term.

Fingerprint Access

Vehicle entry has been transforming over the years, from using keypads to unlock doors, to keyless entry when the fob is in on your person. Taking this the next step further would be fingerprint access. Your iPhone can already use your fingerprint to unlock its home screen, and services like PayTouch want to enable consumers to use their fingerprint to make purchases, so why not unlock your vehicle with your fingerprint too? Your fingerprint could allow vehicle entry and be used to start the car. Of course, there’d need to be a system where you can add authorized fingerprints to also gain access to the vehicle for sharing purposes. But it would be incredibly nice to never have to worry about losing your keys or locking them in the car anymore.

 

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Innovation-laden concept car at CES 2017 By Bosch

Alongside home and work, connectivity is turning the car into the third living space. With the help of personalised communication between the car and the driver, increasingly high performance and comprehensive services will be safe to operate in the future as well. In addition, automated driving will soon give drivers more time to dedicate to other tasks. For instance, drivers and passengers will be able to use time spent in the car to write emails, or entertain themselves with streamed music or videos. In the new concept car, Bosch will be presenting a broad range of innovations, including:

Face recognition and intelligent personalisation: The Driver Monitor Camera makes quick face recognition and personalisation possible from the moment the driver is in the car. For instance, the car sets the steering wheel, mirrors, interior temperature, and radio station according to the driver’s personal preferences. While on the move, driver drowsiness detection helps enhance safety: if the driver risks falling asleep or is very distracted, the car issues a warning and helps prevent critical situations.

Gesture control with Ultra Haptics: The concept car also includes the first-ever gesture control with haptic feedback. Developed with Ultra Haptics, a start-up from Bristol in the UK, the technology uses ultrasound sensors that sense whether the driver’s hand is in the correct place, and then provides feedback on the gesture being executed.

Haptic feedback with neoSense: Thanks to the touchscreen with haptic feedback, the buttons that appear on the touchscreen feel like real buttons. In many instances, this makes it possible to operate the infotainment system without looking. Drivers can thus keep their eyes on the road, and this improves safety. This technology bagged a CES Innovation Award in 2016 and has since taken major strides toward series production.

A crystal-clear OLED-driven display: With the concept vehicle, OLED (organic light-emitting diode) displays have been integrated into the car’s cockpit for the first time. These enable a crystal-clear display. Digital exterior mirrors, now also in the car: The Mirror Cam System is a camera-based solution that replaces both exterior mirrors. The video sensors can be integrated into the vehicle interior, and images are shown on displays close to the A-pillars on the right and left sides of the car. Moreover, the digital technology enables a context-specific display. When a car is on the highway, for instance, the view is concentrated mainly behind the car. In contrast, in city driving, a broader view helps improve safety. Good contrast improves the view when driving at night.

Communication between the car and the driver: In the future, the human machine interface (HMI) will play an increasingly important role in the car – especially when it comes to automated driving. For instance, it lets the driver know whether automated driving is possible on a specific route. To hand over responsibility for driving to the car, the driver must then press two buttons on the steering wheel for several seconds. During the automated drive, the HMI shows the driver what the car’s environmental sensors detect and how much time is left until the driver needs to start driving again.

Communication between the car and the home: With automated driving, drivers have a greater number of infotainment functions at their disposal via the vehicle’s central display than when they are driving themselves. Thanks to the internet connection, drivers can now review upcoming appointments or plan shopping trips, for instance. The smart home app also makes it possible for drivers to operate the awnings or adjust the heating at home. Furthermore, he can check whether there is enough food in the refrigerator. At the touch of a button, the app can transmit the shopping list to the delivery service.

Communication between the car and the bicycle: Thanks to vehicle-to-vehicle-communication, the cars of the future will be informed of other road users long before they are in view. Bicycles in particular are easily overlooked in road traffic because they are hidden by buses or trucks. At CES, Bosch is showing a communication link between the new concept car and a bicycle. With it, vehicles can constantly exchange information about their location and direction of travel. This reduces the risk of collision.

Bosch Integrated Payment Solutions: Bosch developed this ePayment solution, which offers new services via the IoT ecosystem, including a standardised payment function. To enable this, the required agreements have already been signed with many payment systems, including PayPal.

Communication between the car and the workshop: At CES 2017, Bosch is also showing how the connected workshop works in the interplay with web-based services and augmented reality applications. In the future, drivers and workshop operators will be able to plan visits to the workshop more easily, and this will improve work processes when it comes to service.

Retrofittable emergency call service for the car: Bosch is presenting the Retrofit eCall at CES, a retrofittable adapter for the eCall emergency call service. It can easily be placed directly into the cigarette lighter and offers real benefits: An acceleration sensor detects the collision and triggers an emergency call. Via a smartphone app, data on details such as the car’s position are transmitted. The severity of the impact is also analysed, and corresponding measures are automatically initiated. If the collision is only of moderate severity, the control center calls to speak to the driver directly and determine whether a service vehicle or ambulance is required. If the driver fails to answer, an ambulance is alerted immediately.

Firmware updates ‘over the air’ (FOTA): Connected functions and especially highly automated driving call for consistently reliable functioning throughout the vehicle’s entire life cycle. This requires software updates that can be carried out via the cloud. Bosch offers the appropriate communication control units and the central gateway computer, while ETAS and ESCRYPT (both parts of the Bosch Group) provide the necessary transmission and encryption technologies. These ensure functional safety and data security.

Perfectly keyless: With an encrypted digital key on the phone the vehicle can be entered and started without any interaction. When approaching the vehicle, Perfectly keyless will automatically identify the secret key on the phone and perform a distance measurement. Within a specified range to the car, access is allowed. In a similar way starting of the car is only permitted if Perfectly keyless localises the mobile device inside the car. By using a digital key on the user’s mobile device, Perfectly keyless improves personalised car settings and simplifies sharing of car keys with family and friends.

@Info Courtsey: CES 2017

Top 10 Strategic Technology Trends For 2017

Increasingly, the world is becoming an intelligent, digitally enabled mesh of people, things and services. Technology will be embedded in everything in the digital business of the future, and ordinary people will experience a digitally-enabled world where the lines between what is real and what is digital blur.

Rich digital services will be delivered to everything, and intelligence will be embedded in everything behind the scenes. We call this mesh of people, devices, content and services the intelligent digital mesh, and this forms the basis for our Top 10 Strategic Technology Trends for 2017.

Intelligent

Artificial Intelligence (AI) and machine learning have reached a critical tipping point and will increasingly augment and extend virtually every technology enabled service, thing or application. Creating intelligent systems that learn, adapt and potentially act autonomously rather than simply execute predefined instructions is primarily battleground for technology vendors through at least 2020.

Trend No. 1: AI & Advanced Machine Learning

AI and machine learning, which include technologies such as deep learning, neural networks and natural-language processing, can also encompass more advanced systems that understand, learn, predict, adapt and potentially operate autonomously. Systems can learn and change future behavior, leading to the creation of more intelligent devices and programs.  The combination of extensive parallel processing power, advanced algorithms and massive data sets to feed the algorithms has unleased this new era.

In banking, you could use AI and machine-learning techniques to model current real-time transactions, as well as predictive models of transactions based on their likelihood of being fraudulent. Organizations seeking to drive digital innovation with this trend should evaluate a number of business scenarios in which AI and machine learning could drive clear and specific business value and consider experimenting with one or two high-impact scenarios.

Trend No. 2: Intelligent Apps

Intelligent apps, which include technologies like virtual personal assistants (VPAs), have the potential to transform the workplace by making everyday tasks easier (prioritizing emails) and its users more effective (highlighting important content and interactions). However, intelligent apps are not limited to new digital assistants – every existing software category from security tooling to enterprise applications such as marketing or enterprise resource planning (ERP) will be infused with AI enabled capabilities. Using AI, technology providers will focus on three areas — advanced analytics, AI-powered and increasingly autonomous business processes and AI-powered immersive, conversational and continuous interfaces. By 2018, Gartner expects most of the world’s largest 200 companies to exploit intelligent apps and utilize the full toolkit of big data and analytics tools to refine their offers and improve customer experience.

Trend No. 3: Intelligent Things

New intelligent things generally fall into three categories: robots, drones and autonomous vehicles. Each of these areas will evolve to impact a larger segment of the market and support a new phase of digital business but these represent only one facet of intelligent things. Existing things including Internet of Things (IoT) devices will become intelligent things delivering the power of AI enabled systems everywhere including the home, office, factory floor, and medical facility.

As intelligent things evolve and become more popular, they will shift from a stand-alone to a collaborative model in which intelligent things communicate with one another and act in concert to accomplish tasks. However, nontechnical issues such as liability and privacy, along with the complexity of creating highly specialized assistants, will slow embedded intelligence in some scenarios.

Digital

The lines between the digital and physical world continue to blur creating new opportunities for digital businesses. Look for the digital world to be an increasingly detailed reflection of the physical world and the digital world to appear as part of the physical world creating fertile ground for new business models and digitally enabled ecosystems.

Trend No. 4: Virtual & Augmented Reality

Virtual reality (VR) and augmented reality (AR) transform the way individuals interact with each other and with software systems creating an immersive environment. For example, VR can be used for training scenarios and remote experiences. AR, which enables a blending of the real and virtual worlds, means businesses can overlay graphics onto real-world objects, such as hidden wires on the image of a wall. Immersive experiences with AR and VR are reaching tipping points in terms of price and capability but will not replace other interface models. Over time AR and VR expand beyond visual immersion to include all human senses. Enterprises should look for targeted applications of VR and AR through 2020.

Trend No. 5: Digital Twin

Within three to five years, billions of things will be represented by digital twins, a dynamic software model of a physical thing or system. Using physics data on how the components of a thing operate and respond to the environment, as well as data provided by sensors in the physical world, a digital twin can be used to analyze and simulate real world conditions, responds to changes, improve operations and add value.\

Digital twins function as proxies for the combination of skilled individuals (e.g., technicians) and traditional monitoring devices and controls (e.g., pressure gauges). Their proliferation will require a cultural change, as those who understand the maintenance of real-world things collaborate with data scientists and IT professionals. Digital twins of physical assets combined with digital representations of facilities and environments, as well as people, businesses and processes will enable an increasingly detailed digital representation of the real world for simulation, analysis and control.

Trend No. 6: Blockchain

Blockchain is a type of distributed ledger in which value exchange transactions (in bitcoin or other token) are sequentially grouped into blocks. Blockchain and distributed-ledger concepts are gaining traction because they hold the promise of transforming industry operating models in industries such as music distribution, identify verification and title registry. They promise a model to add trust to untrusted environments and reduce business friction by providing transparent access to the information in the chain.

While there is a great deal of interest the majority of blockchain initiatives are in alpha or beta phases and significant technology challenges exist.

Mesh

The mesh refers to the dynamic connection of people, processes, things and services supporting intelligent digital ecosystems. As the mesh evolves, the user experience fundamentally changes and the supporting technology and security architectures and platforms must change as well.

Trend No. 7: Conversational Systems

Conversational systems can range from simple informal, bidirectional text or voice conversations such as an answer to “What time is it?” to more complex interactions such as collecting oral testimony from crime witnesses to generate a sketch of a suspect. Conversational systems shift from a model where people adapt to computers to one where the computer “hears” and adapts to a person’s desired outcome. Conversational systems do not use text/voice as the exclusive interface but enable people and machines to use multiple modalities (e.g., sight, sound, tactile, etc.) to communicate across the digital device mesh (e.g., sensors, appliances, IoT systems).

Trend No. 8: Mesh App and Service Architecture

The intelligent digital mesh will require changes to the architecture, technology and tools used to develop solutions. The mesh app and service architecture (MASA) is a multichannel solution architecture that leverages cloud and serverless computing, containers and microservices as well as APIs and events to deliver modular, flexible and dynamic solutions. Solutions ultimately support multiple users in multiple roles using multiple devices and communicating over multiple networks. However, MASA is a long term architectural shift that requires significant changes to development tooling and best practices.

Trend No. 9: Digital Technology Platforms

Digital technology platforms are the building blocks for a digital business and are necessary to break into digital. Every organization will have some mix of five digital technology platforms: Information systems, customer experience, analytics and intelligence, the IoT and business ecosystems. In particular, new platforms and services for IoT, AI and conversational systems will be a key focus through 2020. Companies should identify how industry platforms will evolve and plan ways to evolve their platforms to meet the challenges of digital business.

Trend No. 10: Adaptive Security Architecture

The evolution of the intelligent digital mesh and digital technology platforms and application architectures means that security has to become fluid and adaptive. Security in the IoT environment is particularly challenging. Security teams need to work with application, solution and enterprise architects to consider security early in the design of applications or IoT solutions. Multilayered security and use of user and entity behavior analytics will become a requirement for virtually every enterprise.

@info courtesy  forbes