With its ongoing speculation of starting its own cab service soon, Reliance Jio Infocomm has now expanded its outfit by signing a deal with AirWire Technologies (AirWire) to offer the latter’s Connected Car IoT device to customers in India.
“Jio has been working closely with AirWire in developing this unique product to enable a suite of services and apps that will make the driving experience unique for the consumers. Jio’s partnership with AirWire provides the connected car device platform in the vehicle for our connected car initiative, Jio Car Connect. Driving, owning, maintaining and securing the vehicle will now fundamentally change with Jio Car Connect and the AirWire device,” a Reliance Jio spokesperson said in a statement, as mentioned on ET.
AirWire Connected Car, which is headquartered in Reno, Nevada, USA has a portfolio of Connect Car apps and services such as hotspot features, location-based apps, automobile telematics security and safety in the telco pan-India advanced 4G/LTE Network.
What is an AirWire Connected Car Device?
It is basically a device which plugs into the vehicle’s Onboard diagnostics port (OBD-II, which is just below your car fuse) over a cable in the vehicle to provide uninterrupted connectivity through Reliance Jio’s advanced 4G LTE network. It has a cloud framework which uploads important vehicle data for analysis and provides convenient and useful apps and services to the consumer’s smartphone.
After the connection to the OBD port, the device provides WiFi and Bluetooth through which smartphone apps provide communication, cinema, TV, Music, games, location data and vehicle telematics. The device also allows smartphones to enable apps like Geo Fencing.
“Jio’s commitment and focus on the Connected Car market will provide the world their first countrywide deployment of this technology. Jio’s deployment strategy will validate the value of big data analytics to enhance the consumer’s satisfaction with vehicle driving and ownership,” said Debashis Bagchi, AirWire Technologies President & CEO.
Connected car device as a revolution
The device transfers the crucial data via a smartphone application and the data can consist of vital information like oil stats, tire pressure, water levels, fuel info, battery change alerts. It can alert the mobile phone users if the connected car isn’t locked properly. It provides data necessary for the app to display information on driving habits such as speed alerts, panic braking details and also speed limits set by choice.
The device can also immobilise the vehicle at the time of theft, alert owner about car movement and locate the car.
Will this accelerate Jio’s cab services than the rest?
Looking at the prospects of the upcoming technology, it is very hard to come to a conclusion right away. But for now, connected car technology is growing at a great speed. Other companies like Samsung are also foraying into connected car tech, as the automotive sector is booming in conjugation with it.
Editors Note: I had visited Reliance Jio Experience Center in the month of October 2016 & we had seen Jio’s Smart Car solution being developed. Here is a video that gives you more information on this!
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Image Source: Team-BHP
