There is no dispute that the automobile as we know it today is undergoing a major transformation. The future promise of autonomous vehicles and the numerous connected car technologies are not only changing the in-vehicle experience, but also how the vehicle communicates with the smart home and smart city. Today, the connected car is becoming an important node in a growing network that supplies relevant information to and from “smart things” like wearable devices, programmable appliances in homes, and even city traffic management systems. Vehicle data collection and exchange has become a major trend in advancing the automotive industry from connected vehicles to fully autonomous vehicles.

The importance of data from the vehicle is well understood. The industry needs a greater emphasis on open standards for identifying data (across vehicle brands) and communicating that data to servers and other gateways. Those same standards can be used to roundtrip actionable messages to the vehicle to alert drivers of known issues and to suggest alternatives. For example, data from the city infrastructure, when combined with vehicle location and speed, can inform drivers of upcoming traffic jams and the proximity to the backup to reduce the chance of potential rear-end collisions. Drivers could also be made aware of an offloading city bus that makes that intersection a “hot zone” for increased pedestrian traffic, with hopes that pedestrian safety is enhanced.

These scenarios and others form the basis of a connected vehicle, smart city collaboration between the GENIVI Alliance and the Nevada Center for Advanced Mobility. This communication pilot project will demonstrate how open standards for vehicle data identification and vehicle-to-server communications will result in better driver awareness with a goal of producing a safer and more connected transportation network in Las Vegas and southern Nevada. During this pilot, GENIVI will deploy its Remote Vehicle Interaction (RVI) software as a proposed open standard for vehicle-to-server communication, securely passing vehicle data to city-run servers and actionable messages back to the vehicle.

As the progression of the connected car continues, data exchange based on open standards and embedded software will be an essential piece to technology advancement in vehicles, in traffic lights, in smart home appliances, and other devices participating in the Internet of smart Things. Standards-based vehicle software such as RVI, deployed across multiple vehicle brands, will make this new connectivity a reality and will strengthen the foundation for future autonomous vehicle deployments in cities.

While there is no crystal ball indicating how far the automobile will progress in the coming years and decades, we can be assured that vehicle data will play an important role as cars become an essential part of the highly connected world of the future.

Steve Crumb is Executive Director of the GENIVI Alliance.

GENIVI Alliance

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