Amid the usual complement of robots, smart home tools, and traditional electronics at CES 2020, the connected automobile is taking center stage.
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The announcements pegged to connected, electric and autonomous vehicles are piling up. What's surprising about the CES 2020 parade of transportation-related announcements is there are plenty of real-world integration deals underway.
Exhibit A would be BlackBerry QNX and its partnership with Amazon Web Services. BlackBerry said its QNX unit would demonstrate a connected vehicle platform along with AWS. The idea is that QNX, a real-time OS that dominates autos, will connect with AWS's Internet of things services.
BlackBerry QNX and AWS are targeting automotive OEMs to bring services, personalization, health monitoring, and advanced driver assistance (ADAS) to vehicles. AWS will power the cloud, and edge compute portion of the QNX platform, which is already embedded in various in-vehicle systems.
While these deals and partnerships don't have the wow factor of drones that can operate on land and air, robots, and foldable devices, they do add up into real enterprise, transportation, and logistics applications. Given that backdrop, it's not surprising that Elaine Chao, US Secretary of Transportation, and Ola Källenius, head of Mercedes Benz Cars, will deliver CES 2020 keynotes.
Rivian's effort to integrate Alexa directly includes features such as controlling windows, HVAC, and other systems. The integration will also have tools to ensure usage even when connectivity is lagging.
Harman also said that it's working on designing its in-car systems to work better with electric vehicles, which can be drained by audio and personalized entertainment systems.
Panasonic highlighted its collaboration and OneConnect platform with Tropos Motors, which enables "right-sized" electric vehicles for things like firefighting and public safety in metro areas and corporate campuses. OneConnect is also used to provide analytics for Harley Davidson and its LiveWire motorcycles. The idea is that data from the vehicles can influence design for next-gen models.