Samsung and its subsidiary HARMAN have now released eight new videos providing a more in-depth look at some aspects of the connected vehicle technologies platform first shown at CES 2018. The videos are intended to show the value of the platforms as scalable for use across the auto industry. Specifically, these are technologies that leaders in that market would be able to incorporate into their own vehicles as smart and self-driving vehicles begin to saturate the market. They cover the gamut of what might be expected from smart cars and their IoT-centric nature. That includes everything from a smart vehicle chassis and shells to adaptive interactive audio experiences and other features centered around a rider or driver’s mood. There’s a lot of information to cover here, but everything starts with the companies’ Snap ecosystem.
Snap is effectively a full vehicle proof of concept platform which shows off two separate innovations – including the chassis, which the companies call the skateboard, and an outer shell called the pod. Both are customizable to suit their intended uses whether that’s as a mobile office space or just a more general way to get people from point A to point B. Both also implement Samsung’s telematics-driven DRVLine vehicle automation platform. What makes the concept unique is that it also allows for a secure custom experience for each individual user immediately upon their entering the vehicle. The variant showed at CES also included SoftBank’s A.I.-powered Pepper bot for personalized person-to-vehicle interaction, individualized for each passenger. The platform adjusts to passengers based on their online cloud profile. That gives the entire system insights into what music or entertainment they love or hate, as well as other preferences. Shared playlists are made available for groups of users and each passenger can also choose to watch their own movie over a 5G connection if they don’t feel like interacting with one another on longer trips. Meanwhile, passenger data can be removed from the vehicle securely when they exit, so these could serve as a perfect platform for autonomous ride-sharing services.
Moving past the concepts that are shown with Snap, Samsung also introduced several adaptive technologies that could be used in self-driving and connected human-driven vehicles alike. Those include a scalable unified cockpit design, a display dubbed Moodscape, and customizable audio experiences. Although each is presented as a separate platform, they would obviously work best in conjunction with one another. To begin with, Samsung and HARMAN’s new digital cockpit platform allows for a more personalized experience via connected screens that are scalable to suit the needs of an automaker. The entry-level platform can drive up to three displays at once while the premium segment supports up to seven displays. The use of those ranges from touch displays used in general human-vehicle interactions, such as adjusting the radio or navigation, while other displays are incorporated into things such as temperature control knobs or a vehicle’s speedometer. Samsung takes things further with Moodscape, which embeds a QLED display in the ceiling of the car for controlling lighting or showing video. That also ties into a system by which the car’s onboard A.I. can assess the mood of passengers and a vehicle’s stereo system. So the vehicle can effectively attempt to create a specific mindset for the driver and riders through adjustments to audio and visual stimulation. Of course, all of that audio is enhanced by HARMAN’s extensive experience in audio via a comprehensive and customizable audio tuning suite called AudioworX. Finally, the audio in some configurations can be further customized via a new range of “shapeshifting” speakers and rotatable soundbars – bringing a whole new level of individualization to in-car audio.
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