Ford has come up with a new mobility solution for cities: less congestion, vehicle and third-party connectivity, location-based services, route mapping, alerts, identity management, payment processing, data and analytical services, and much more. To achieve these goals, bits of distinct data to flow from public transportation services, self-driving cars, cyclists and even infrastructure will be needed.
The first step is to establish a platform that enables the communication between different transport methods, and Ford is working with Autonomic, a Silicon Valley-based company, to build an open cloud-based platform — the Transportation Mobility Cloud for this purpose. According to the American multinational, “This platform can manage information flow and basic transactions between a variety of components in the transportation ecosystem — service providers, personal vehicles, bicycles, pedestrians, mass transit systems and city infrastructure, including traffic lights and parking locations.” The cloud can collect and process data in real time and provide a multitude of services, a process which will allow eventually even build apps.
The city of today could use real-time location updates from vehicles to control traffic flow, dynamically rerouting cars to reduce congestion, improve commuting times or account for construction projects, sporting events and emergencies. A city can ensure no empty self-driving vehicles are driving on the most important arteries used by people during their rush hour commute home. This platform can even help cities define safer pick-up and drop-off zones for ride-hailing services.
The full article from Rich Strader, Ford Vice President, and Sunny Madra, Autonomic CEO, is available at this link.
