At the upcoming Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas, Nevada, Continental will present a special show vehicle – the ‘Intelligent Vehicle Experience Car’, which focuses on “external communication between humans and automobiles” and can recognize users before they enter the car. The tech solutions that will be demonstrated in this vehicle are expected to go into series production in the next three to five years.
The vehicle will demonstrate a solution that provides intuitive, touch-free access to the vehicle using biometrics, which enables the car to recognise users even before they get into the vehicle by interpreting facial and movement characteristics and deriving actions from them, such as opening and starting the vehicle or opening the tailgate in the supermarket parking lot. More importantly, it also identifies persons who are not authorized to use the vehicle and may approach it with criminal intent. In this case, the doors remain locked, and a warning is activated.
“Biometrics opens up completely new horizons for the mobility of tomorrow,” explained Dr Claudio Longo, head of research and advanced engineering at Continental.
For Jean-François Tarabbia, head of architecture and network solutions at Continental, intuitive access is a key component: “The car is on track to become a smart device, similar to a cell phone, which will use biometric technologies to take the user experience to a new level of security and comfort.”
A wide range of functions are possible using biometrics. Among other things, Continental’s demo car demonstrates approach detection (the car detects approaching persons), user identification (the car identifies authorized persons using facial recognition), intention recognition (the car recognizes the intention of an approaching person, for example by interpreting a hand movement in the vicinity of the door), and intuitive trunk access (the trunk opens automatically when an authorized person looks in the direction of the tailgate for a certain period of time).
