Ford at CES Announces Smart Mobility Plan and 25 Global Experiments Designed to Change the Way the World Moves

Ford at the 2015 Consumer Electronics Show is highlighting how it is using innovation not only to create advanced new vehicles but also to help change the way the world moves by solving today’s growing global transportation challenges.

Ford Announces Winners of Innovate Mobility Challenge Series, a Worldwide Approach to Finding Mobility Solutions

Ford has named the latest winners in its Innovate Mobility Challenge series, a key part of Ford Smart Mobility – the first widespread implementation of the company’s long-term plan for sustainable mobility solutions.

Mobility Experiment: Big Data Drive, Dearborn

More than 200 Ford employees have volunteered to allow the company to collect driving data from in-vehicle sensors. By applying big data analytics, researchers can learn more about how people move and see patterns that can help them derive mobility solutions and improve products based on how drivers actually use their vehicles.

Mobility Experiment: Car Swap, Dearborn

The car you own may not fit all of your needs all of the time, such as when you need to haul landscaping material or move a child to college. Car Swap is an experiment using Ford-owned fleet vehicles. Participating Ford employees use a mobile app that allows them to search for a vehicle that meets their needs, and negotiate terms of the swap. The experiment will provide an in-depth understanding of how Ford can help make car swapping easier.

Mobility Experiment: City Driving On-Demand, London

While there are many car-sharing services based on the reservation model, the focus of this experiment is on-demand use. Researchers are exploring how to optimize the service, such as offering pay-by-minute and enabling one-way trips across the city. A fleet of Ford Focus Electric vehicles and Ford Fiestas with EcoBoost powertrains is located across London. Users can register, get directions to the nearest service location, reserve a vehicle and pay – all through a mobile app. The London service targets a better customer experience and improved operational efficiency compared to existing car-sharing models. Car-sharing through the use of zero and low-emissions vehicles can reduce congestion and pollution.

Mobility Experiment: Data Driven Healthcare, Africa

In West Africa, unpaved roads and a lack of reliable transportation prevent people from accessing healthcare. Ford is working with Riders for Health, an organization that manages and maintains fleets that deliver healthcare workers to patients who need help. Equipping Ford pickup trucks and SUVs with OpenXC technology will help better maintain the vehicles, as well as allow for vehicle data to be collected that could improve productivity. Ford is also using data collected to create maps of the region, where most mapping companies do not go.

Mobility Experiment: Data Driven Insurance, London

This experiment studies a driver’s behavior over time in order to build a more personalized mobility profile. The goal is to create a driving behavior passport that can be used to calculate more exact insurance rates and allow drivers to take the information with them, from car to car or from insurance carrier to insurance carrier. Vehicle data might enable lower insurance rates for good drivers.

Mobility Experiment: Dynamic Social Shuttle, New York and London

For city dwellers, Ford is investigating a shareable service of premium mini-buses offering point-to-point pick-up and drop-off on-demand. The goal is to better understand the social dynamics and routing requirements of shared transportation. Commuters enter a starting location and a destination into a smartphone app. A shuttle that accommodates four to 10 passengers picks up and drops off commuters at convenient locations, taking the most suitable route for all passengers on board.

Mobility Experiment: Fleet Insights, United States

Ford engineers are working with HP, one of the world’s largest technology companies, to track the driving habits of 100 vehicles used nationwide by HP employees for work and personal commuting. The project will shed light on the purpose behind the trips, how drivers interact with external factors such as weather and traffic, and how to further personalize time behind the wheel. The data is gathered by devices plugged into the HP fleet vehicles and could lead to better products and services.

Mobility Experiment: Info Cycle, Palo Alto, California

Engineers are working to develop sensor kits based on Ford OpenXC that gather information from bicycles and other common forms of transportation in urban areas. The devices gather data such as wheel speed, acceleration and altitude, among other information. The data could provide insight into how alternate modes of transportation might be best positioned to serve future urban mobility needs.

Mobility Experiment: Painless Parking, London

In London, Ford is working to make parking easier for drivers and the city. Drivers voluntarily use plug-in devices that create live data on traffic and parking. The City Dash app tells users whether they are legally parked. If not, the app recommends the nearest open spot. It allows drivers to pay for parking meters by mobile phone, and identifies the closest available parking spots to the driver’s final destination.

Mobility Experiment: Parking Spotter, Atlanta

This experiment, conducted with Georgia Tech, leverages driver-assist sensors that most Ford vehicles already have, including sonar and radar, by putting them to work for everybody. The sensors search for open parking spaces while the driver looks for spots around the city, and share the information with a cloud database other drivers can access. The system makes it easier for a driver to locate an open spot, reserve it and navigate to the space. It also reduces fuel consumption and carbon dioxide emissions.

Mobility Experiment: Rapid Recharge & Share, Dearborn

Electric vehicles would be beneficial as urban shared vehicles because they have lower operating costs and can be “refueled” in their parking space. But if a shared car is consistently being driven, it needs time to charge. Ford is investigating a partnership with a retail or fast-food business to develop a fast-charging infrastructure, making electric vehicles practical choices for car-sharing. The goal is to make electric vehicles easier to use, because when more people choose to drive one, everyone benefits from lower carbon emissions.

Mobility Experiment: Remote Repositioning, Atlanta

Using Georgia Tech-owned golf carts to prove out the technology, a person sitting in a remote location can access real-time video streamed over LTE to drive the carts. The outcome could be a more affordable and widely available valet parking service.

Mobility Experiment: Share-Car, Bangalore, India

In Bangalore, Ford is working with Zoomcar to test a sharing concept that would allow small groups, such as co-workers, apartment dwellers and families, to share a vehicle among multiple drivers. The approach helps consumers who can’t afford a car but want the benefits of owning one. Researchers plan to develop a model for vehicle scheduling and managing ownership.

Mobility Experiment: Ford Carsharing, Germany

For city dwellers, Ford is investigating a shareable service of premium mini-buses offering point-to-point pick-up and drop-off on-demand. The goal is to better understand the social dynamics and routing requirements of shared transportation. Commuters enter a starting location and a destination into a smartphone app. A shuttle that accommodates four to 10 passengers picks up and drops off commuters at convenient locations, taking the most suitable route for all passengers on board.

Innovate Mobility Challenge: Accessory Challenge, Australia

Ford Motor Company is defining a challenge in Australia, the country with the third-lowest population density in the world.

Innovate Mobility Challenge: Accessory Challenge, Johannesburg

Commercial vehicles transport people, animals and goods wherever they are needed, but the vehicles’ usefulness does not have to end when they’re parked. Equipped with the right technology and accessories, commercial vehicles could be used as a base to bring critical services to people who have little or no access in urban and rural areas.

Innovate Mobility Challenge: City Mobility, Lisbon, Portugal

On the narrow streets of Lisbon, congestion has worsened with population growth due to the mountains and hills surrounding the city – making the task of moving goods and services around even more difficult.

Innovate Mobility Challenge: Future of Mobility, Argentina

As traffic density increases in large cities, it becomes more difficult for people to get around efficiently. Challenge participants were asked to submit an innovative idea to reduce traffic jams that is also environmentally and economically sustainable.

Innovate Mobility Challenge: Mobility Integration Challenge, Chongqing, China

Chongqing, China, is challenged by drastic geographical changes and extreme congestion, requiring multiple modes of transportation that struggle to move people into, out of and through the city quickly and efficiently.

Innovate Mobility Challenge: Monsoon App Downpour, Mumbai, India

Mumbai is known for its monsoon rains in the middle of summer. The heavy rains last up to four months, and result in flooded roads and railways that create long delays for the 12 million residents of the area. People simply can’t get around to do what they need to do.

Innovate Mobility Challenge: Parking Lot 2.0, Los Angeles

Downtown Los Angeles has more parking spaces per acre than any other city, and the number has grown by about 1,000 every year for more than a century, Los Angeles Magazine reported in 2011. Yet finding a place to park isn’t getting any easier – especially during peak traffic times.

Innovate Mobility Challenge: SUMURR Golden Hour, Delhi, India

Trauma patients have a better chance of survival if they receive care within 60 minutes of being injured – known as the Golden Hour.

Innovate Mobility Challenge: SUMURR mHealth, Tamil Nadu, India

In many parts of the world, there is a divide in the availability of healthcare between where people live – cities and rural areas. In India, for example, 72 percent of the population lives in rural areas, yet 75 percent of healthcare services are in urban centers.

Innovate Mobility Challenge: Traffic Tamer, London

London’s busy streets and limited parking space mean drivers have a hard time getting from place to place, and an even harder time finding somewhere to park when they arrive.

Innovate Mobility Challenge: Urban Commuter, Shanghai

Ford asked developers to create software that would improve quality of life for urban and long-range commuters in congested cities such as Shanghai. Finding reasonably priced parking near favorite destinations, for example, has become more difficult as downtown areas grow.