According to recent analysis by the Boston Consulting Group, the growth in autonomous vehicle adoption will accelerate significantly during the next two decades, with more than 12 million fully autonomous vehicles sold per year globally by 2035. One of the main goals for vehicle automation is increased road safety, which has been a priority for SmartWitness since it began developing products in 2007. The company’s industry leading safety technology has produced solutions that redefine the way vehicle risk is identified and analysed.

SmartWitness is bringing 4G LTE connectivity to its next generation in-vehicle camera technology as the video telematics leader pushes further into data enabled advanced driver assistance systems (ADAS), in the form of software and hardware designed to decrease traffic incidents and reduce disputed insurance claims.

For its forthcoming KP2 connected in-vehicle camera SmartWitness, whose technology helps identify and reduce driving risks, have turned to multinational wireless communications equipment designer and manufacturer Sierra Wireless to provide highly reliable 4G LTE connectivity.

The KP2 will be powered by the industrial-grade Sierra Wireless® HL Series embedded modules with 4G LTE Cat-3/4 technology to enable a reliable connectivity for real time, two-way communication. “This is a significant advancement that gives us the scalability we need as we move toward technology-based road safety improvements designed to reduce risk and incident frequency to better serve our customer,” said Chris Pflanz, SmartWitness Product Director.

The KP2, which can be added-on to an existing telematics platform or be used as a stand-alone system, has a sleek, low profile design, which attaches to any windshield with ease, making a small footprint important for the embedded components. The camera recording system is also tamper-resistant, with a tamper switch that sends out an alert if it is forcibly removed from the windshield. In addition to the integrated Sierra Wireless HL Series IoT Modules, the KP2 also includes a 1080p HD video camera with 170-degree wide-angle lens, Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, GPS/Glonass, a 6-axis accelerometer, expansion capability up to 16 cameras, built-in CAN interface and a RESTful API available for integration with any web application.

“We’re most proud of the ADAS and two-way audio features because they help to prevent accidents from happening in the first place,” said Pflanz. “Our ADAS technology alerts the driver if he’s following too closely to the vehicle in front or if he/she changes lanes without signalling, the assumption being the driver is tired and drifting. The two-way audio allows fleet management or dispatch to easily call the driver via hands-free, or speak with the driver in the event of an emergency. None of this would be possible without a reliable communication technology, which is critical for the real time, two-way communication that makes our in-vehicle products effective. Any downtime can be detrimental to a tired driver and his/her employer.

“Without our products, our customers would not have the visibility into their fleet’s locations and traffic incidents, so their claims costs and disputed claim rate would stay high. Fleet driver behaviour would not be monitored and reported, resulting in less incentive to follow the rules of the road, which ultimately creates a higher risk of incident.”

SmartWitness

About the Author: John Loughran