To unveil the technology that the companies use in everyday consumer products and to showcase the new innovative gadgets, the International Consumer Electronics Show (CES) is one of the best places. This is for new startups and for well established big companies. In this article, we will see a few of the technological trends in the automobiles at 2014 consumer electronics show.
- Self driving car: Prototypes which have the capability of autonomous driving and concept cars are unveiled by a few companies. One of them is Audi’s A &, which itself is piloted onto the state. An all-electrical vehicle, Navia shuttle introduced by the Induct Technology. It drives itself and is fit for ten people standing. This is available in the United States from this year onwards. BMW introduced a highly automated driving car which helps in emergency situations. It has electronically controlled steering works with accelerator and brakes with perfect harmony.
- Connect with smartphones: The Open Automotive Alliance (OAA) is an affiliation of automakers Hyundai, Honda, General Motors, Audi and the tech companies Google and Nvidia with a view of bringing Android operating system into the vehicles. Audi is launching Android into its upcoming vehicles. The reasons for this are Android is more friendly to develop the apps than the Apple, Android is a open source platform, Audi and Google already had established relationship with Google Mapping data, and a recent study by the IDC showed that 81 percent of smartphone shipments are Android based third quarter of 2013 data. This will enable the driver to sync the music across their tablets, phones and vehicle, getting the new applications like weather, traffic, etc.
- Advanced infotainment controls: The old stereo systems are no longer used by the automakers. Today, they have the flexibility to design new infotainment systems that are more intuitive and safer. Mazda Connect is the next generation infotainment system launched by Mazda in its 2014 Mazda 3. The system designed with a simple user interface. Regardless of the function that using by the driver, it shows consistent look.
- Car interface wearable technology: This is the first time that we saw interaction of the car and the wearable technology in the CES. A Pebble smartwatch having Digital Drive Style App by shown by the Mercedes Benz. It display the basic information of the car, and also give the vibrate alerts of upcoming accidents or traffic on the road. A Samsung Galaxy Gear smartwatch was shown by the BMW. i Remote app in the watch helps to run the 2014 BMW i3 electric vehicle. This device display the battery charge, doors and windows status, and the climate control. To give the navigation directions, this app can recognize the voice commands.
Automakers announce before and in the consumer electronics show their technological advancements in the vehicles. Most of these are on connecting the vehicles. Tech companies are putting their efforts in automobiles to make driving more enjoyable, cleaner and safer.