The tip of the iceberg

Looking to increase business efficiency? When it comes to tomorrow’s vehicles, GPS is just the tip of the iceberg.

Where would we be without GPS? As with many ever-present technologies that have inched into our lives to become a ‘can’t-live-without’ tool, it’s hard to recall a time when we didn’t rely on these devices to get us from one place to the next.

Of course, we’ve moved on from a simple navigational device to integration with other technologies, which increasingly provides business-wide benefit. Big data is no longer just a buzzword and the ability to capture and analyse information means that meaningful insights can be drawn and used to develop strategies for increasing overall business efficiency.

More than a map

Like the humble street directory before it, GPS as a navigation-only tool has pretty much had its day. Advanced functionality now allows users and organisations to derive many additional benefits. At a navigational and positioning level, fleet and field service managers can accurately pinpoint the location of team members, enabling sophisticated route optimisation and improving scheduling. Making real-time updates available to customers and estimating technician arrival times with increased accuracy also has clear benefits in terms of meeting service delivery promises and client expectations.

It also means that staff utilisation levels are optimised, eliminating extraneous downtime. Integration with other enterprise systems streamlines human resources, payroll and accounting functions and decreases the burden on the back office in terms of data entry and other forms of manual input. With so many clear advantages, it’s hard to believe that many small to medium-sized businesses still elect not to implement such technology, but it seems they do.

Safety and savings

Integrating GPS tracking functionality with onboard cameras gives you a bird’s-eye view into driver behaviour, as well as allowing you to verify any issues or provide proof of service in the event of a customer dispute. Alerts and warnings can be automated, providing another level of safety, and a program of preventive maintenance achieved through the integration of fault code monitoring to identify issues before they become safety problems. Programming regular maintenance reminders also ensures that the fleet remains on the road and thereby improves asset utilisation.

Keeping connected

Clearly the key to efficient operations is integration, the first step towards a more complex form of connectivity. Mobility research expert Juniper Research defines telematics as “the use of wireless technologies and in-vehicle IT to relay information to and from vehicles, with the aim of improving the driver experience or providing additional information and analysis to the driver or a third party”.

So, we already live in the age of the connected and the benefits to business users are well established. For consumer markets, the value chain is less defined. Juniper’s report ‘On track with connected & self driving vehicles’ suggests this is due to vastly differing application requirements.

For commercial users, engine maintenance, fleet tracking, freight tracking, driver behaviour and logistics are the key priorities. There is little crossover for the consumer, whereby telematics use is geared more towards infotainment, usage-based insurance calculation, vehicle location, servicing, emergency response and theft protection. Third-party telematics requirements include traffic data, driver behaviour and road safety, but provision of this information remains a contentious issue due to privacy concerns.

The final frontier is vehicle-to-infrastructure (V2I) and vehicle-to-vehicle (V2V) connectivity, which promise to deliver a truly intelligent road transportation system. Early examples of V2I include ramp metering but, according to the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE), this will further develop into more sophisticated scenarios in which overall emissions, fuel consumption and traffic speeds will be controlled. The IEEE suggests that this type of interactive driving will be deployed sometime between now and 2020.

The institute concedes that V2V is a more difficult concept to realise because it is decentralised in structure, requiring vehicle interaction and information interchange at a local level. Agreement between car manufacturers and other suppliers is required in order to implement V2V, as true interoperability demands consensus on communication technology and protocols.

Central to the intelligent transport system concept is the autonomous vehicle. While deployment of V2I and V2V may seem simple enough, the IEEE says that the Vienna Convention on Road Traffic (an international treaty to facilitate road traffic and increase safety) presents a significant stumbling block. The convention states that “every driver shall at all times be able to control his vehicle”, thereby contradicting automatic control as a concept. The treaty was developed in 1968 and enforced in 1977, so it’s probably due for amendment in order to align with projected advances.

The road to autonomy

Research and business management firm Boston Consulting Group (BCG) estimates that partially autonomous vehicles will hit the market in the next couple of years. Contrary to the name, partially autonomous vehicles actually operate with a high degree of autonomy but are limited to specific driving situations including highway driving and lane changing. User input is still required in all other circumstances.

Fully autonomous vehicles, which require little or no driver intervention, are set to hit the streets in 2025 according to BCG, but it remains to be seen how this technology will deal with current limitations including severe weather conditions and an inability to accurately distinguish obstacles.

BCG’s research indicates that consumer demand for this functionality will be high, citing 55% of drivers in the United States as likely to consider purchasing a partially autonomous vehicle and 44% likely to consider purchasing a fully autonomous one.

Of course, this functionality will come at a price, but the research suggests that consumers will be willing to pay an additional US$4000 for features including self-driving (highway and traffic) and autonomous parking. The drivers for demand include lower insurance premiums, reduced fuel costs and improved safety.

Factors that will largely determine uptake levels incorporate: the maturity of the technology, resulting legislative changes or requirements and the mitigation of important risks including reliability and cybersecurity.

The introduction of this type of technology will challenge current vehicle ownership norms, as shared cars may prove to be a more economical option when compared with outright ownership.

Ethical concerns

Much of the available research on autonomous vehicles deals with factual elements, but there is an increasing focus on moral considerations. Specifically, how should a car be programmed to behave in the event of an unavoidable accident?

This is the subject of academic research being carried out at the Toulouse School of Economics in France, which finds there are several options: should loss of life be minimised even if it means sacrificing occupants of the car, should occupants be protected at all costs or should the car randomly select between these extremes?

There is no simple answer, of course, and the study focuses on the human response to the dilemma, hoping to highlight the intricacies of the issue and looking beyond fuel efficiency, traffic control and emissions reduction.

We live in interesting times and the next 20 years will present significant change in terms of transport advances. How we respond remains to be seen, but it’s unlikely we’ll ever yearn for the days of the street directory again.

Image credit: © iStockphoto.com/Mlenny