Nobody really knows when self-driving cars will become commonplace, but when they do, Volvo wants you to sit back, relax, and binge-watch your favorites shows while you’re along for the ride.
Speaking at CES 2016 in Las Vegas, Volvo revealed it is developing interruption-free media streaming capabilities with Ericsson to ensure self-driving car passengers can catch up on Catastrophe while traveling.
Using Ericsson’s network and cloud expertise, Volvo’s self-driving cars will predict how long the drive is and tailor your content to the duration of the trip. Volvo says the content can be “intelligently buffered to deliver a high quality and uninterrupted viewing experience.”
“Our research shows that almost 70 per cent of all mobile data traffic will be from video in the coming years,” says Claes Herlitz, ?Head of Automotive Services at Ericsson. “This requires an innovative connectivity, cloud and analytics solution that is not only capable of serving multiple moving vehicles across a highway, but also has the capacity to provide the high quality, uninterrupted video service today’s consumer is accustomed to.”
“We recently unveiled our design vision for fully autonomous cars with Concept 26. Now we are actively working on future solutions to deliver the best user experience in fully autonomous mode,” says Anders Tylman General Manager Volvo Monitoring & Concept Center at Volvo Car Group. “Imagine a highway full of autonomous cars with their occupants sitting back watching their favorite TV shows in high definition. This new way of commuting will demand new technology, and a much broader bandwidth to ensure a smooth and enjoyable experience.”
“If you want to watch the latest episode of your favorite series, the car will know how long the journey needs to take and can optimize the route and driving control accordingly,” adds Tylman. “With autonomous drive it is no longer just a question of just getting from A to B quickly – it’s about the experience you wish to have in the car – how you wish to spend the time you are saving. With our future autonomous drive technology we will provide people with the freedom to choose the way they would like to commute and the content they would like to experience.”
Volvo, which in 2015 said it will take responsibility whenever one of its self-driving cars crashes while operating in autonomous mode, better hope its self-driving car technology is fail-proof. Because no human driver will be prepared to take over the wheel while binge watching their favorite Netflix shows.
