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Cyclists’ helmets may soon be able to communicate with cars if Volvo’s collaboration with sports gear manufacturer POC and Ericsson goes on general sale.

Working with the two companies, Volvo has developed a helmet prototype that is capable of communicating with a connected car to provide proximity alerts to driver and cyclists in a bid to prevent accidents from occurring.

Collisions between cars and cyclists is a global concern. In Europe, 50% of all cyclists...

Picture credit: BMW

Smartwatches have only started hitting the mainstream consumer market this year, but German car manufacturer BMW is already coupling the technology with its vehicles.

BMW is dreaming of a world where people can get out of their car on the ground floor of a multi-story car park, tap their smartwatch and let the car drive through the levels to an available space on its own.

This technology currently only exists in the company’s BMW i3 research vehicle, equipped with the fully automated...

Picture credit: Jaguar Land Rover

Augmented reality has been seen in cars for the first time as part of Jaguar Land Rover’s new 360 Virtual Urban Windscreen research.

The car manufacturer has developed a new concept that completely reinvents traditional GPS navigation by projecting a ghost car in front of the driver to follow. The idea is to keep a driver’s eyes on the road and avoid the distractions that come with dash-mounted hardware.

Jaguar Land Rover has made the whole solution even more...

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German manufacturer Audi has announced Audi unite, a way for friends colleagues or neighbours to share the use of their car using an interactive app.

With the help of digital design house Kram/Weisshaar, Audi is hoping to give people a more economical way to use its cars. An app lets up to four drivers make car reservations, while a personalised beacon makes it possible for the vehicle to recognise each driver.

The app also communicates with the vehicle to show drivers the location of the...

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The idea of the digital supercomputer car has been around since the 80’s. Characters like Knight Rider’s K.I.T.T had the ability to learn, communicate and even connect with Michael Knight on some emotional level, not bad for a Pontiac Trans Am.

While in the 80’s it seemed that the reality of an intelligent car was only for the magic of television, today we not only have intelligent cars, but are heading towards a future where your car can be your personal...

Insurance telematics concerns could simply be sensationalised hyperbole if new research by LexisNexis rings true for the wider population.

The company’s 2014 Usage-Based Insurance (UBI) white paper revealed how consumers’ comfort levels surrounding the sharing of UBI driving data were on a similar level to other internet-related tasks such as online banking and social media.

In fact, both online search data and social media personal rated higher on the study’s concern scale than UBI driving...

Telecommunications company Huawei has announced that it will be investing heavily in future infrastructure technologies as it prepares for the era of autonomous cars. Fifth generation mobile internet (5G) has been discussed as a solution to the substantial bandwidth requirements that vehicles are likely to require when communicating with other road-based objects. In a recent article on the Financial Times, Huawei CEO Eric Xu, revealed that talks with car manufacturers were already on the agenda. However, the discussions must still be at an early stage as Xu failed to disclose any specifics. Bandwidth capacity There is a worry that even...

Picture credit: AT&T

AT&T’s innovation and research centre Drive Studio already has 12 companies signed up and now LG Electronics has joined the party.

LG is hoping to work with Studio to develop new services for future connected cars, with it focusing mostly on hardware and equipment rather than the software side that many are investing in.

Drive Studio has been built to help with the research and development of the connected car industry and includes working garage bays, a speech lab, a full...

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Smarter cars equate to more data being available on an owner’s driving habits, a notion not lost on US trade organisation the Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers that has announced new guidelines to manage consumer anxiety.

In a statement released on the Alliance’s website, Mitch Bainwol, the body’s president and CEO, immediately set out to allay consumer concerns by explaining how important it was to be transparent about the features of connected...

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German car manufacturer Volkswagen (VW) has announced a new partnership with Inrix, a move that offers a glimpse at the type of data drivers will have at their fingertips over the coming years.

Inrix, a big data company that specialises in traffic information, analytics and driver services for connected cars and smart cities worldwide, will be offering VW access to its Inrix Park and Inrix Fuel services.

VW intends to use the Inrix products in its new European Passat models...

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Digital rights group the Electronic Frontier Foundation has moved to dismantle copyright legislation that prevents car owners from tinkering with their own vehicle's software programming.

The USA’s Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA), a series of copyright laws that aims to protect the rights of both copyright owners and consumers, restricts access to a car’s electronic control unit (ECU) on the grounds of vehicle safety.

A host of requests have been filed with the...

Picture credit: Mojio

As car manufacturers invest large sums of cash in technology that will connect drivers of new models to the internet, Canadian company Mojio has set out to fill the used car void.

Boasting an open platform, Mojio says its hardware will connect any car to the internet of things through premium mobile phone networks. The company has signed agreements with AT&T in the US and TELUS in Canada.

The open platform that Mojio offers already has a number of apps in its store, with support from...

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Global automotive supplier Visteon has lifted the lid on its own interpretation of where the connected car industry is headed over the next few years.

With eyes as far ahead as 2018, Visteon has announced details of its Fusion connected platform that it says will launch in four years time. The infotainment platform bundles together driver information, infotainment and Cloud connectivity into a human machine interaction (HMI) experience.

Visteon’s Tim Yerdon, global leader,...

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Mobile coverage in the UK is far from seamless, especially when users travel across the country, but Westminster has announced plans to combat these so-called ‘not-spots’.

The UK government revealed that poor mobile coverage causes regular frustration to approximately one fifth of the UK. You can forget data connectivity, this inadequate reception leaves users without the ability to perform basic tasks such as sending texts and making calls.

One of the suggested remedies is...