AUTONOMOUS DRIVING & LBS

3D LiDAR sensor by SOS LAB

SOS LAB has introduced its new and improved 3D LiDAR sensor to the international market recently. In addition to their 3D hybrid LiDAR for autonomous vehicles, SOS LAB displayed their 2D scanning LiDAR for auto-guided vehicles and drones, and their 2D solidstate LiDAR, used in security systems to detect near-field (5-10m) obstacles. Current hybrid scanning method and upcoming solid-state designs by the company are expected to set the industry standard for affordable, accurate scanning solutions for autonomous vehicles.

Xilinx and ZF to jointly enable AI innovation and autonomous driving development

Xilinx, the leader in adaptive and intelligent computing, and ZF Friedrichshafen AG (ZF), a global leader and Tier-1 automotive supplier in driveline and chassis technology as well as active and passive safety technology, have announced a new strategic collaboration in which Xilinx technology will power ZF’s highly-advanced artificial intelligence (AI)-based automotive control unit, called the ZF ProAI, to enable automated driving application. www.xilinx.com

Audi collaborates with Luminar Technologies to work on LiDAR

Audi is hoping to have its very own autonomous vehicles on the road by 2021 and as its contribution to the partnership, Luminar will provide Audi vehicles with forward-facing high-resolution and long-range LiDAR technology.

AID (Autonomous Intelligent Driving) is wholly owned by AUDI AG and is positioned as the ‘center of excellence’ for urban autonomous driving in the Volkswagen Group. The company is working on the development of a full software stack that will leverage AI and machine learning for perception and prediction to localization, trajectory planning and interface to sensors and computers for Audi future autonomous driving vehicles.

Lidar plays an important role in the functioning of self-driving cars. It emits laser beams which bounce off objects so that the AI system in the car can get a 3D representation of its surroundings. When lidar works in combination with other sensors including cameras and radar, it functions as the ‘eyes’ of an autonomous car, and detects objects in front of the vehicle including people, animals and other vehicles on the road. www.luminartech.com

MapmyIndia launches the intelligent tracking device

MapmyIndia, has announced the launch of intelligent tracking device compliant with AIS 140 (Automotive Industry Standard 140), certified by ARAI (Automotive Research Association of India) and in line with Ministry of Road, Transport & Highways (MoRTH) directive & notifications. The tracking device have been especially developed for use in commercial and public transport vehicles.

The devices come loaded with MapmyIndia’s telematics platform “InTouch” integrated with the detailed maps empowering all commercial vehicles with live tracking, route creations, geofence management & alerts etc. It goes beyond track and trace and offers much more viz. reports on the engine vitals, driver behaviour, drive history etc. on optional basis. www.mapmyindia.com

Transport modelling software ready for automated vehicles

How will automated and conventional vehicles interact in the transition period to fully automated vehicle fleets? How can this coexistence be managed and how will future transport models look like? The European research project CoEXist, in which the PTV Group is also involved, is dealing with those questions. After 18 months of work, the multidisciplinary team of 15 project partners has now reported its first major success: The transport modelling software is “automated vehicle-ready”.

Thus, one of the main objectives of the three-year project, funded by the Horizon 2020 framework program of the European Commission, has been achieved. The PTV research team worked closely with partners from Renault, the French institute Vedecom, TASS International and the University of Stuttgart, supported by the Swedish National Road and Transport Research Institute, the city of Helmond in the Netherlands and the University of Florence, Italy. Thanks to this cooperation, simulations were run, enabled by the connection of the control logic of autonomous vehicles from Vedecom, the TASS International software PreScan and the microscopic simulation software PTV Vissim. www.h2020-coexist.eu

Collaboration on Aircraft technologies for urban air mobility

Honeywell and Pipistrel have signed a MoU that will bring both companies together to explore and develop solutions for the urban air mobility market. The companies will integrate Honeywell avionics, navigation, flight control systems, connectivity and other beneficial products and services onto a future Pipistrel Vertical Takeoff and Landing (VTOL) air vehicle to support fully autonomous operations in the future.

Urban air mobility is an aviation industry term for on-demand and automated passenger or cargo-carrying air transportation services, typically flown without a pilot. Urban air mobility services will bring innovative new ways for people to travel around cities and rural areas, while reducing congestion. www.honeywell.com

Yandex self-driving car navigates public streets

Yandex’s self-driving car navigated the public streets of Las Vegas during CES 2019 without an operator behind the steering wheel. The car safely ferried dozens of passengers to demonstrate the latest advancements of Yandex’s selfdriving technology and the scalability to operate the vehicle against new traffic conditions in Las Vegas.

Starting in late November, the Yandex team retrofitted a Toyota Prius with an array of radars, lidars, and cameras that interpret the world around the car. Radars are located in the front and rear bumpers, the lidars are on the roof, and five cameras mounted around the car capture 360-degree video. The combined sensors can identify objects within a 200-meter radius of the car. This incoming information is processed by the custom-built computer that sits in the trunk of the car, which runs on proprietary software built by our team.

Passengers could see the car processing the world around it on two tablets, one mounted on the dashboard by the safety engineer and the other on the center console for rear passengers. Passengers were able to track the car in real-time on a high-definition map of the streets it was traversing, including the planned and possible routes of the vehicle in addition to 3D models of vehicles, pedestrians, and dynamic icons of traffic lights. yandex-team.com

Location on mobile devices to protect privacy

An Iowa State University researcher says repeatedly pinpointing our location reveals information about our identity, which may be sold or shared with others. It is a problem Ying Cai, an associate professor of computer science, recognized more than a decade ago when he first started working on a solution, and it has only gotten worse.

A team of New York Times reporters demonstrated that when it used location information collected through a single company›s database to identify individual users and track their daily activities. According to the December 2018 story, companies sell, use or analyze this data for insight into consumer behavior.

It may seem consumers have no choice if they want to use such apps and services. However, Cai says there is a way to limit what companies can glean from location information. Working with ISU’s Office of Intellectual Property and Technology Transfer, Cai received two patents for his location-cloaking technology (one in 2014, a second in 2017).

The technology makes it possible to search and use apps on mobile devices while keeping your privacy under control. The concept behind the technology is simple: to provide a location that is as precise as possible, but still sufficient to protect the user›s privacy. Specifically, users give examples of locations matching their personal privacy level. Cai says service providers then use that information to calculate a cloaking region with a similar popularity. https://phys.org

OnTerra Systems introduces low-cost GPS fleet tracking

OnTerra Systems, developers of RouteSavvy route optimization software has announced the availability of innovative, cost-effective GPS tracking for small to mid-sized fleets using the driver’s mobile device (cell phones or tablets). This innovative technical approach allows small to mid-sized fleets access to GPS tracking at a fraction of the cost of typical GPS fleet tracking technology. This new, affordable GPS Fleet Tracking technology works as part of the RouteSavvy web application for displaying driver location and history. OnTerra System’s new GPS Fleet Tracker features allow managers of small to mid-sized fleets to track and monitor vehicles in the fleet via cell phones. www.RouteSavvy.com

Fake GPS navigation app detected on Google Play Store

A malware expert with ESET, Lucas Stefank has detected that there are apps operating in the Google environment which borrow inputs from Google Maps app and then peddles them to its customers for a fee!

Google, however, quickly reacted and moved in to do damage control. Many of the apps identified by Stefanko have since been removed from the Play Store.

A majority of them this time are in the GPS and navigational systems areas. And these apps have already been downloaded and are used by over 50 million users worldwide. These people would not have known that what they are using are not official Google apps but mere fake ones. Some have been seen just popping up ads on the mobile phone screens of the users.

Indian Railways join hands with ISRO to allow live tracking

Indian Space Research Organisation, ISRO has started working with Indian Railways to track trains and automatically feed the control charts about the train’s arrival and departure.

“A new beginning has been made in the new year: the train movement information is acquired and fed to the control charts using ISRO (Indian Space Research Organisation) satellite-based real-time train information system (RTIS) automatically,” a senior railway ministry official stated.

After the collaborative effort of ISRO and Indian Railways, a satellite-based system will also help railways in mapping the area as well as it will come in handy at the time of accidents when it can be used to ascertain the exact location of trains and topography. www.businessinsider.in