In connected car news this week were NXP, VW, Walmart, Gatik, Kavaser, TNO, Siemens, Vayyar, Valens, BMW, Renesas, Sasken, Kyocera and TomTom.
iDrive.ai?
There have been reports that Apple is buying autonomous company Drive ai. There has been no confirmation. However the Drive.ai Medium blog has been deleted. The Drive.ai Facebook, LinkedIn, web and Twitter presence remain intact as of this evening.
DMS from NXP & Momenta
NXP Semiconductors and Momenta, a pioneer in software solutions for autonomous driving, announced a collaboration on automotive-grade Driver Monitoring Solutions (DMS). These solutions form the basis of the systems that monitor driver attentiveness, and play important roles in increasing safety on the road and helping carmakers address upcoming NCAP requirements. The joint effort between NXP and Momenta aims to enable car makers to deploy DMS applications into mass automotive production.
Driver Monitoring Systems are one of the interrelated parts of advanced driving assistance systems (ADAS) and are essential for Level 3 and higher driving systems. The systems use deep learning algorithms to visually monitor and detect a driver’s lack of attention to the road and can offer pre-collison warnings. Euro NCAP has made DMS a primary safety function slated for NCAP incorporation by 2020 and some forecasts predict a market of more than one billion dollars by 2026.1
The first solution from the NXP and Momenta collaboration will combine the high performance, power-efficient architecture of NXP’s Open Vision Platform (S32V2) with Momenta’s deep learning software and expertise. The solution aims to optimize, compress and accelerate deep neural networks so that they can run efficiently on an automotive-grade DMS embedded platform.
Electrify America More Fast EV Charging Stations
Electrify America and Walmart announced that more than 120 plus ultra-fast electric vehicle (EV) charging stations are now operational and open to the public at Walmart stores across the U.S. Building upon the original commitment set forth in April 2018, the companies are planning to expand the relationship in the coming years with additional Electrify America charging stations located at Walmart stores across the country.
Electrify America, Walmart Announce Completion of over 120 Charging Stations at Walmart Stores Nationwide with Plans for further expansion.
Gatik & Walmart B2B Short Haul Autonomous
Gatik, a Palo Alto-based startup deploying autonomous vehicles for business to business (B2B) short-haul logistics, launched with Walmart ) as a partner. Gatik brings delivery and logistics into the future with Level 4 autonomous light commercial trucks and vans for B2B short-haul logistics.
Kvaser Filter for EV Assist
EB Assist ADTF (Automotive Data and Time-Triggered Framework) is a popular development and test environment for advanced driver-assistance systems (ADAS) and highly automated driving (HAD) software that supports projects from prototype to series development. It includes features such as capture and synchronization of data from different sensor sources such as radar, lidar and cameras, real-time data playback, data handling, processing and visualization, in the laboratory and the test car.
The filter developed by Kvaser for EB Assist ADTF 3 will enable any Kvaser device to be found within the software, including all new Kvaser hardware releases.
EB Assist ADTF 3 also supports Kvaser’s virtual hardware concept, which enables users to develop, test or demonstrate a system even when they don’t have the Kvaser hardware installed.
TNO & Siemens
TNO and Siemens announced that Streetwise, TNO’s real-world scenario database for automated driving, can now be used in the Siemens simulation environment Simcenter Prescan. This enables faster validation of CAD systems by using real-world scenarios.
With conventional testing of CAD systems it is hard to tell if a system has been sufficiently tested. TNO’s StreetWise provides statistical characterisation of driving behaviour. This includes the probability of scenario classes and the variation within the scenario classes.
Siemens Simcenter Prescan now enables the direct search and import of scenarios using the TNO’s StreetWise web API. Scenarios are imported using the open standard OpenSCENARIO. In this way, real-world scenarios become available for massive testing in the Siemens Simcenter tool environment. Using the test automation tooling HEEDS, testing can be narrowed down to critical ranges and system behaviour can be characterised.
Vayyar 4D Point Cloud App Radar
Vayyar, the global leader in 4D imaging technology, announced the launch of the first automotive 4D point cloud application on a single radar chip. 4D point cloud transforms radar technology by constructing a real-time, high-resolution 4D visualization of both in-cabin and car exterior environments.
Vayyar’s low-cost, high-performance single chip with point cloud displays the dimension, shape, location and movement of people and objects, enabling the complete classification of the car’s environment, regardless of bad lighting or harsh weather conditions. Click here to see how point cloud technology works.
Vayyar’s point cloud creates a new opportunity for a holistic solution maximizing in-cabin and exterior safety. In-cabin solutions include seat belt reminders, optimized airbag deployment, gesture control, driver drowsiness alerts, and infant detection alarms, even if the infant is covered by a blanket or hidden in a car seat or in the foot well. Vayyar’s exterior solutions map and classify the car’s surroundings to enable enhanced parking assistance, blind spot detection, lane switching assistance, automatic speed and distance control, and alerts for height obstacles, obstructions and more.
MIPI Selects Valens
Valens, the leader in ultra-high-speed in-vehicle connectivity, announced that the MIPI® Alliance has selected its technology as the baseline for the Alliance’s A-PHY physical layer standard targeted for automotive applications. The A-PHY standard will define an asymmetric physical layer for the automotive market to provide high-speed links for cameras, displays and sensors, through native CSI-2 and DSI/DSI-2 interfaces, to support autonomous driving and other use cases.
Valens’ technology provides the necessary resilience and performance for high-speed processing in the very noisy in-vehicle environment. It brings the most reliable and powerful solution to support high speeds required in connected and autonomous vehicles, over existing cables and connectors.
MIPI Alliance’s selection of Valens’ technology followed an in-depth evaluation process, including testing and analysis of several proposed solutions from member companies. Valens’ solution was determined best-suited to address the need for high-speed, in-vehicle video links, and to support the range of bandwidth defined by the A-PHY standard. Two main profiles were outlined for the standard – Profile 1 to support lower speeds, and Profile 2 to support all speeds from 2Gbps up to 48Gbps and above (e.g., 100 Gbps). Profile 2 will be based on a Valens’ PHY-level Retransmission Scheme (RTS) with Narrowband Interference Cancellation (NBIC), as published by the MIPI Alliance.
The final specification is expected to be completed by the end of 2019.
BMW Sustainable Rubber Alliance
In conjunction with representatives of social institutions, NGOs and the rubber processing industry, the BMW Group established the independent Global Platform for Sustainable Natural Rubber (GPSNR) at an inaugural meeting in Singapore in March. The aim is to make the entire rubber value chain verifiably sustainable. The automotive industry is one of the world’s largest consumers of natural rubber.
Rubber is made from the latex milk collected from rubber trees. In most cases, cultivation takes place in monocultures in Southeast Asia, across an area spanning more than eight million hectares. Over 80 percent of natural rubber is grown on very small farms – making it difficult to monitor social and environmental growing conditions.
The BMW Group only purchases natural rubber indirectly. However, since transparency and sustainability throughout the value chain are an integral part of the company’s philosophy, it has taken steps over the years requiring greater sustainability from tyre manufacturers. The BMW Group alone needs around 24,000 tons of natural rubber per year for vehicle tires.
iVentures & Yellowbrick
BMW i Ventures invested in Palo Alto-based Yellowbrick, the technological leader in big data warehouse solutions that helps businesses derive value from large data sets in real-time. Yellowbrick’s unparalleled performance is based on an integrated full-stack system of hardware and software including their own database and file storage system.
Cohda & Sasken V2X
Cohda Wireless, a global leader in Connected Autonomous Vehicles technologies, and Sasken Technologies Ltd. a leading product engineering and digital transformation services provider, announced a strategic technology partnership to accelerate the adoption of V2X (vehicle-to-anything) in the connected vehicles space utilizing either cellular or DSRC (dedicated short range communication) technologies. The companies have come together to create a complete TCU (Telematics Control Unit) software reference design that would include Sasken’s TCU software and middleware coupled with Cohda Wireless’ DSRC/C-V2X (cellular V2X) stack and applications.
Renesas New Software
Renesas Electronics Corporation (TSE: 6723), a premier supplier of advanced semiconductor solutions, continues to accelerate the development of advanced driver assistance systems (ADAS) systems with a new Perception Quick Start Software based on its R-Car V3H system-on-chip (SoC). The solution delivers reference software for camera obstacle detection (COD), LiDAR obstacle detection (LOD), and road feature detection (RFD) – three key recognition areas for sensor-based Level 2+ autonomous vehicle systems.
The R-Car V3H SoCs deliver a combination of high computer vision performance and artificial intelligence processing at low power levels, providing an optimized embedded solution for automotive front cameras in Level 2+ autonomous vehicles (Note 1). To achieve state-of-the-art recognition technology, Renesas designed the SoCs with dedicated hardware accelerators for key algorithms including convolutional neural networks, dense optical flow, stereo disparity, and object classification. The new perception software provides an end-to-end pipeline reference for developers working with these complex yet cost-effective and power-efficient accelerators, which allows customers to kickstart their application design whether they are experts at using the accelerators or have limited experience. The reference software covers input from sensor or recorded data, all stages of processing and display output on a screen.
Kyocera and BYD Supply Energy
Kyocera Corporation and BYD Japan Co., Ltd. (herein “BYD”), the Japanese arm of China’s BYD Co. Ltd., a world-leading producer of electric vehicles (EVs), announced a joint project to develop an integrated renewable supply-demand energy system for EVs. By combining renewable energy from Kyocera’s solar power generating systems and BYD’s electric buses, the collaboration will maximize the effectiveness of renewable energy, greatly reduce power losses, and maintain a stable supply-demand energy balance.
For this project, Kyocera will develop the energy charge management system to optimally control the supply-demand balance between energy production and consumption by using aggregation technology developed during Virtual Power Plant (VPP) test projects over the past several years. This system will also incorporate the Kyocera’s renewable energy generating system. Meanwhile, BYD will supply two models of electric buses; K9, a large electric bus already available to the global market and J6, a compact electric bus specifically developed for the Japanese market which will be available in spring 2020. Additionally, BYD will use its technological expertise in developing electric buses and insights from energy consumers to consult on the project.
TomTom Traffic
TomTom Traffic provides accurate information about traffic jams and expected delays on a planned route, helping drivers make better decisions that save time, reduce stress and make roads a safer place. It is an accurate, real-time service, driven by more than 600 million connected devices, that collects data on over 3.5 billion km of roadways per day.
The SORA-P60 sensor is free of any rotational or frictional components, making the sensor impervious to mechanical wear and tear. In addition, the new SORA-P60 features rugged housing designed to withstand harsh environments, cold climates and salt spray.
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