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HERE PLATFORM ENABLES HANDS-FREE DRIVING FOR FORD CUSTOMERS

Ford’s Active Drive Assist, a new driver-assist feature that allows for hands-free driving on more than 100,000 miles of divided highways in all 50 states and Canada, relies on the HERE Workspace to determine the locations of hands-free zones.

HERE Technologies, the leading location data and platform company, today announced that Ford chose the HERE platform to enable its safe hands-free driving. The HERE platform enables Ford to create an availability map that informs Ford vehicles when it’s possible for Active Drive Assist to offer hands-free driving across 100,000 miles of highways in the United States and Canada.

It’s a straightforward process: Ford uses the HERE Workspace to create, develop and scale location-centric data sets and services in one secure environment. The Workspace provides access to HERE map content, dynamic data such as traffic and weather, Location Services and location algorithms such as map-matching, along with comprehensive developer, visualization and analytics tools to power location-based solution development and operation.

All of the content and tools enable Ford to create their own reliable map. This customized map is a key input into the vehicle via the Ford cloud to determine whether or not hands-free driving is available. Active Drive Assist then fuses the map with local sensing to provide hands-free driving when conditions are appropriate. The driver is still able to take control of the vehicle at any time, and they must keep their attention on the roadway.

“We’re so pleased that Ford turned to the HERE Workspace for their creation, deployment and scaling of location-centric data products, services and applications – especially as hands free driving starts becoming more commonplace across the United States and Canada,” said Charity Rumery, Vice President of Automotive at HERE Technologies. “We look forward to helping Ford vehicles determine where their drivers can take their hands off the wheel with Active Drive Assist.”

>> HERE Hazard Warnings service powers Local Hazard Information for new Ford Puma and other Ford vehicles

>> Ford to contribute vehicle sensor data to HERE for development of its Connected Vehicle Services

The new Ford Puma can enable a safer driving experience thanks to new Local Hazard Information powered by HERE Hazard Warnings. The service delivers drivers important targeted information about potential road hazards, accidents and potentially hazardous driving conditions. They are created from sensors onboard of millions of connected vehicles, and not by a driver’s manual input. By the end of 2020, the service will be expanded to more than 80 per cent of Ford’s vehicle line-up.

HERE Hazard Warnings is part of the Connected Vehicle Services suite from HERE Technologies. These are the first services on the market for intelligent and connected vehicle technology which aggregate anonymized high quality, rich and real-time sensor data from connected cars of different vehicle brands. Ford of Europe is also now giving HERE access to traffic-related sensor data from its fleet of connected vehicles for enhanced safety, further expanding the dataset HERE can utilize for the development of these services.

HERE transforms this data into useful and safety-relevant information for drivers and passengers via its location platform. Drivers can receive it with low latency through a car’s instrument cluster or its head-up display unit. In the case of Ford, the functionality is enabled by the FordPass Connect on-board modem through which drivers can receive Local Hazard Information - even without embedded navigation on the multimedia system - either as a background warning or as an urgent pop-up.

“We are pleased that Ford chose HERE Hazard Warnings for the new Ford Puma and other models so that drivers can be warned about road hazards in advance. The sensor data that Ford vehicles contribute will further enhance the safety of all drivers using our Connected Vehicle Services, built on the HERE platform”, said Jørgen Behrens, SVP and Head of Applications at HERE Technologies.

“We are delighted to be working hand-in-hand with HERE Technologies to deliver these smart features on more than 80 per cent of our line-up in 2020, enabled by the FordPass Connect embedded modem. In a world where there is so much available data, it is becoming increasingly important to find smart new ways of applying it to improve the lives of our customers”, said Peter Geffers, Manager, Connected Vehicles, Ford of Europe.

HERE Hazard Warnings delivers safety-relevant information and warnings based on car sensor data on:
> Accidents;
> Broken down vehicles;
> Slippery roads;
> Heavy rain;
> Fog and reduced visibility.