Carnegie Technologies, a leading wireless connectivity solutions provider, and Continental have announced a deal that further expands Continental’s portfolio of holistic vehicle connectivity for vehicle manufacturers.
Under the agreement, Continental is reselling Carnegie Technologies’ Network Convergence Platform as part of Continental’s Smart Telematics portfolio for vehicle manufacturers. The solution runs on Continental’s next generation telematics control unit (TCU) with a supporting cloud-based component for analytics and diagnostics.
As cars move along the roadways, this technology provides bandwidth aggregation and gapless handover of calls and data for faster speeds and seamless switching between different networks, such as Wi-Fi, LTE, 3G and satellite. These capabilities are essential for new data-intensive applications such as autonomous driving and over the air (OTA) vehicle updates, ensuring that vehicles and drivers can always make use of the fastest, most reliable and most secure network connection available to the automobile.
The joint Smart Telematics solution continuously scans and measures available networks and the vehicle’s bandwidth requirements, and then automatically aggregates the networks to provide the fastest, most reliable and cost-efficient connection, the two companies say. In addition, Smart Telematics includes Carnegie’s VehicleLink, which uses bandwidth from passengers’ smartphones and tablets, when available, to reduce data costs and provide the best connection possible.
Carnegie’s Gapless Handover allows Continental’s Smart Telematics solution to deliver continuous data flow. If a cellular connection gets weak, but a Wi-Fi hotspot or smartphone with a different provider is available, it automatically switches the data flow to the most efficient data provider. If the connection is lost temporarily, such as driving through a tunnel, calls and data sessions can stay activated in the background until a connection is reestablished, providing session persistency.
Vehicle manufacturers can have full control over when and how the bandwidth aggregation and gapless handover are configured. They can choose which applications can use the embedded mobile network solution, prevent applications from using unsecured networks or set other parameters and rules. For example, media sync may be limited to the home Wi-Fi connection, passenger tablets can be prevented from using the embedded mobile network or video conference calls can be set to seamlessly transition between embedded LTE, Wi-Fi or even satellite to avoid interruption in service.
“At Carnegie, we’ve been working on the bandwidth requirements and needs for connected vehicles for more than four years, and we’re proud to have been selected by Continental to help deliver this end-to-end solution to automobile manufacturers,” said Paul Posner, CEO of Carnegie Technologies. “As cars become more and more integrated with the internet, our technology delivers the reliable, secure and cost-efficient connectivity they need to interact with their environment from the road.”
