Automotive News Canada - April 2023 - 20

20
* APRIL 2023
TRANS-CANADA NEWS
5,000 KILOMETRES OF STORIES
CONTINUED FROM PAGE 3
Vehiqilla Inc., founder
AJ Khan told the
Windsor Star that
a deal with Secure
Elements of the
United Kingdom
brings further expertise
and diversity to
local cybersecurity
and technology fields.
The two companies
agreed to a collaboration
March 7 aimed
at providing automotive
customers a more
holistic cybersecurity
solution.
Vehiqilla and
Secure Elements
expect " major hiring "
from 2024 onward,
though Khan said the
number of jobs created
will be determined
by how the market
develops.
But " all the elements "
for sector
growth are in place
in Windsor and the
wider region, including
education and
trained talent. The
work could eventuKhan:
" All
the elements "
are in place
in Ontario for
cybersecurity
sector
growth.
FILE PHOTO
ally extend beyond automotive
to serve " other mobility spaces
- aviation, space and drones -
with cybersecurity challenges
to be solved, " Khan said.
Secure Elements founder
Saket Mohan said the company
uses artificial intelligence
to power its technology, which
helps engineers analyze product
development and troubleshoot
weaknesses during design and
usage. - Joe Knycha
1,200 fast chargers, and
hundreds more coming
QUEBEC CITY - THE
provincial government plans
to spend $60 million to expand
the province's network of
direct-current electric vehicle
charging stations by 30
per cent, building on what is
already Canada's most developed
network.
Quebec currently has more
than 1,200 fast-charging stations,
the government said in
a release. When the expansion
is finished, 40 per cent of all
public direct-current chargers
available in Canada will be in
Quebec, it added.
The latest funding provides
government support to private
companies to buy and
install 367 charging stations
of 100 kilowatts or more at 131
sites across the province, said
Environment Minister Benoit
Charette. - Steve Mertl
P.E.I. pulls the plug
on free EV chargers
CHARLOTTETOWN -
An update to Prince Edward
Island's electric vehicle incentive
program on March 1 means
the province is dropping the
offer of a free electric vehicle
charger with each rebate.
EV buyers tapping into the
province's Universal Electric
Vehicle Incentive will continue
to receive $5,000 toward the
purchase of an EV, but they will
now get an additional $750 to
buy a charger as opposed to getting
a standard home charger
for free.
The province said the
change will allow EV customers
to select the charger of their
choice, though buyers are likely
to be out-of-pocket for a portion
of their purchase, which is typically
more than $1,000.
The update to the provincial
program also makes large EVs
up to $70,000 eligible for incentives,
putting it back in line
with the federal zero-emission
vehicle rebate program, which
raised thresholds last year.
- David Kennedy
Cashing in on the cockpit
Automakers will soon
be making money - and
potentially a lot more of it
than by selling cars -
with data, subscriptions
and other services
By DAVID KENNEDY
T ORONTO BUREAU CHIEF
THE POINT AT WHICH INTELLIGENT
vehicle systems can take control of the
wheel, step in with advice on route planning
and keep tabs on the habits and
behaviours of drivers is no longer a distant
prospect.
The handful of companies involved
in outfitting the intelligent cockpit of
Project Arrow, the Canadian electric
prototype vehicle, aim to get in on the
ground floor of this connected-vehicle
era. The goal is to make driving
more convenient while generating a
stream of consumer data
that can be monetized.
" There's going to
be an inflection point
where the data's more
valuable than the
metal and plastic, " said
Flavio Volpe, president
of the Automotive
Parts Manufacturers'
Association (APMA).
While Project Arrow
stays rooted in the present
- it is designed to
2025-model-year standards
- the trade association
behind the project
focused on connectivity
and data monetization from the
outset.
The auto industry has had a cockpit for
a long time, said Ron DiCarlantonio, CEO
of the Toronto-based technology company
iNAGO Inc., but it's " not very good. "
" It started as a radio, " DiCarlantonio
said. " It's now a computer, but it doesn't
do very much. It does a fraction of what
your phone does. "
INAGO designs intelligent assistants,
including the one in Project
Arrow. DiCarlantonio describes them as
unbranded versions of Amazon's Alexa
or Google's Assistant that can be catered
to specific applications, in this case, facilitating
communication between a driver
and vehicle.
COCKPIT COOPERATION
The assistant is one part of Project
Arrow's interconnected web of technologies
that are built atop an open-software
architecture as opposed to proprietary.
INAGO is also one of the companies
that make up the Mutualism alliance, an
international group that banded together
to modernize
how vehicle
cockpits are
designed. It
includes parts
suppliers Denso
Corp., and
DRIVE FOR DATA
SPOTLIGHT
ABC Technologies Holdings Inc., and the
telematics company Geotab Inc., among
others. Mutualism added new members to
work on Project Arrow.
The team's overarching goal,
DiCarlantonio said, is to create a realworld
version of the talking computer of
KITT, the Pontiac Firebird Trans Am in
the 1980s TV show " Knight Rider. "
With iNAGO's assistant acting as the
conduit, drivers can tap directly into the
other tools that the Mutualism partners
have built into Project Arrow's cockpit.
Oakville, Ont.-based Geotab, for instance,
embedded its telematics technology.
TOOLS AND TIPS FOR DRIVERS
DiCarlantonio:
The goal is
to create
TV's " Knight
Rider " Trans
Am in the real
world.
SUPPLIED
PHOTO
Commonly used today for fleet monitoring,
telematics keeps tabs on a vehicle's
location as well as its onboard diagnostics.
Within Project Arrow, the system offers
drivers recommendations, such as possible
locations to stop to charge the vehicle's
battery before running low.
As cities adopt new technology, telematics
will enable the vehicle to interact
directly with on-road sensors embedded
within streetlights and other infrastructure.
Other
tools take direct control over
vehicle systems. For instance, a driver
There's going to be an
infl ection point where
the data's more
valuable than the
metal and plastic. "
Flavio Volpe
President, Automotive Parts
Manufacturers' Association
Kehayas:
The intelligent
cockpit lets
automakers
pick and
choose the
technologies
offered.
SUPPLIED
PHOTO
can ask to bump up the temperature in
the cabin by a degree or two, prompting
the assistant to process the command and
engage with the HVAC
system.
Because the intelligent
cockpit uses an open ecosystem,
like Google's
Android smartphone
platform, it will allow a
broad range of companies
to create and integrate
their own tools,
DiCarlantonio said.
Mutualism is also
plug-and-play, meaning
automakers can take
their pick of the technologies
offered, said
George Kehayas, a business
development consultant
for connected cars at Geotab.
" The flexibility of the Mutualism platform
is the fact that if you want two [technologies],
you can have two. If you want
eight, you can have eight. It's customizable. "
PITCHING
IT TO AUTOMAKERS
Since Project Arrow's launch at CES
in Las Vegas in January, Geotab and
iNAGO have begun speaking with automakers
about using all or part of the platform
in their next generation of vehicles,
Kehayas and DiCarlantonio said.
Some automakers might want to
adopt the entire Mutualism platform,
DiCarlantonio said, while others that
have already built their own software
platforms might be interested in individThe
cockpit of the
Project Arrow concept
vehicle offers drivers
convenience and
companies opportunities
to make money from
reams of consumer data.
PHOTO: APMA
ual offerings after seeing how they function
within the Mutualism package.
" They will build it, " he said, " but they
will see the use cases that we've been able
to pull together, and they can duplicate
what we've done here in their platform
but still use us to meet that functionality. "
Calkins:
Automakers
will
be
able to sell
subscription
services for
everything
from heated
steering
wheels to
in-vehicle
safety
coaching.
SUPPLIED
PHOTO
How automakers choose to give their
customers access to
the tools is up to them,
said Sherry Calkins,
vice-president for connected-car
and platform
solutions at Geotab. But
it opens the door to subscription
services for
everything from heated
steering wheels to in-vehicle
safety coaching.
" It's going to allow the
manufacturers ... to provide
additional services
that can be monetized, "
Calkins said.
Intelligent vehicle
systems are also poised
to collect vast reams of
behavioural data on drivers,
said the APMA's
Volpe. That data will
be valuable to insurers,
banks, retailers and
numerous other actors.
In the not-too-distant future, he said,
purchase or subscription models are likely
to emerge in which those who allow
that data to be repackaged and sold to
third parties can expect a discount on the
vehicle. - ANC
Automotive News Canada - April 2023

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