Charles Jillings, CEO of Utilico, energized by strong economic momentum across Latin America. Watch the video here.
Brock
EV sales did slow down in the last Qtr in General & most of our stuff is in EVs. Headlines last 3 months of 2023 were rife.
https://www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/electriccars/article-12715035/Electric-car-sales-continue-falter.html
https://www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/electriccars/article-12715035/Electric-car-sales-continue-falter.html
https://theweek.com/electric-vehicles-sales
https://www.wsj.com/business/autos/eu-new-car-sales-slipped-in-december-after-16-months-of-growth-6ff936df
Iam sure the OEMs will be pushing them like crazy now.
Good to start seeing as standard....
Earlier this month, the automotive industry welcomed the 2025 Lincoln Aviator, which marks a significant step forward in integrating luxury and advanced technology within the American SUV segment. The vehicle marked the introduction of the Lincoln Digital Experience and BlueCruise hands-free highway driving technologies, highlighting Lincoln's focus on enhancing connected driving experiences.
The 2025 Lincoln Aviator solidifies its position as a luxury leader by ensuring a wealth of high-end features come standard, including BlueCruise for hands-free driving, enhancing the journey for four years. The Lincoln Digital Experience serves as a technological cornerstone, providing an intuitive interface for interaction with the vehicle's systems.
https://www.autoevolution.com/news/sophistication-redefined-the-2025-lincoln-aviator-s-tech-advanced-leap-forward-229095.html
Seeing Machines Chief Science & Innovation Officer, Professor Mike Lenné, said the partnership would provide valuable insights into human behaviour as in-vehicle technologies are developed.
"We are delighted to be partnering with QUT on the Chair of Empathic Machines, a critical collaboration to ensure that in-vehicle technologies are developed and implemented safely. Our approach to driver and occupant monitoring is uniquely based heavily on human behaviour and we look forward to being able to leverage the outcomes of this initiative to continue our leadership position in this space and achieve our vision of getting people home safely."
Successful applicants will have an honours degree or equivalent, with backgrounds in psychology, vision science, computer science, HMI, data science, data-based management, machine learning, or robotics.
https://www.qut.edu.au/news?id=192631
CARS
Ford Is Getting Rid Of Its Self-Parking Assist Feature: Here's Why
Ford
BY JOE CAPRARO/FEB. 8, 2024 3:17 PM EST
Ford has been making automobiles since 1903, and in that time vehicles have evolved from primitive machines like the legendary Model T – which had a hand-crank starter and zero electronic components or safety features — to essentially moving computers with advanced active driver assist systems that help us avoid collisions, navigate busy roadways, and even park when our journeys have ended.
Ford's BlueCruise system beat out all other carmakers' active driver assist systems in a recent Consumer Reports study, but Ford will be dropping one feature from the system soon, although the reason is older than the Model T. In fact, Ford's reason behind this move is as old as the concept of business itself. Ford will save about $10 million a year for a total of about $2 billion by eliminating the active park assist feature from the BlueCruise suite. Bloomberg quoted Ford COO Kumar Galhotra saying on an industry conference call, "Very, very few people are using it so we can remove that feature. It's about $60 per vehicle." The self-park assist feature guided Ford drivers during parallel parking, a task that was found to be one of the most stressful for motorists in an MIT study. It's worth noting that Ford participated in that study along with MIT and later, a Ford dealership cited it in a blog post bragging about the same technology.
Read More: https://www.slashgear.com/1513242/ford-gets-rid-of-self-parking-feature-reason-explained/
We're officially launching our next generation world-leading driver safety technology to our Aftermarket customers at #GeotabConnect 2024 in February. Visit us to discover #Guardian Generation 3: our driver #drowsiness solution that's been independently tested and complies with the European Commission’s #GSR 🚚 #SeeingMachines #DDAW
https://www.linkedin.com/posts/seeingmachines_geotabconnect-guardian-drowsiness-activity-7155771220251078657-h02g?utm_source=share&utm_medium=member_desktop
Brock
5Yrs may be the average contract length but in 1st Year its still 50x that of Auto. Hardware sales and 12 months monitoring is prob $500.
5000 units in a qtr is like 250k cars income coming in the following 12 months.
Really hoping that Gen3s kick off this Year and Legislation starts seeing this motoring on.
Caterpillar Inc. supports site safety with technology to see, mitigate and manage fatigue and distraction on site. The Cat® MineStar™ Driver Safety System (DSS) comes under the global OEM’s MineStar Detect suite of solutions and uses a high-tech camera to monitor eye-closure duration and head pose, then instantly alerts operators via seat vibration and an audio alarm alert the moment fatigue or distraction is identified.
MineStar DSS is the one of the leading fatigue detection systems globally. Sean McGinnis, Vice President and General Manager of Technology and Global Sales Support at Caterpillar told IM Editorial Director, Paul Moore: “The market has been growing faster in the past few years as mines focus ever more closely on safety. Since 2021, Caterpillar fatigue management system units running globally have increased 80%. This includes use in both mining fleets and support equipment such as light vehicles, mobile maintenance vehicles and buses that are also being used on mine properties. And this support equipment part of the market is really a big focus now. Support equipment vehicles are equipped with a similar solution from the MineStar Detect portfolio for light vehicle applications called Guardian 2 which was initially designed for fatigue and distraction monitoring in off-highway vehicles.”
So the MineStar DSS footprint continues to grow. But the solution is not standing still – McGinnis told IM: “Today’s offering, what we call DSS 5.0, which is deploying in the market now, has some fairly significant upgrades to the underlying algorithms that relate to head position tracking, eye closure tracking and facial recognition. This is backed up by an improved camera that has enhanced granularity particularly in relation to the eye tracking.”
McGinnis also gave some insight into how much better and smarter the camera systems are becoming. “Today we can detect if an eye closure is just due to dryness or itching for example, as opposed to an unplanned or uncontrolled eye closure related to fatigue.”
He adds on the market itself: “A lot of the focus now is not just on support equipment but also the mid-tier miners – including industrial minerals operations and quarries with smaller fleets and smaller classes of machines. Their operators still get tired – it is just that the first wave of fatigue management system deployment – not just from us but from other players – was in the large mines, most of which now have some kind of system installed, whether predictive or reactive or both.”
https://im-mining.com/2024/02/08/cat-dss-evolving-and-growing-rapidly/
Brock
We just need more numbers as fleet on a 5yr contract brings in a lot more than auto per unit.
$1300 monthly’s
$1200 hardware
Each truck is worth about 250 auto licences income less hardware cost & monitoring direct expenses.
Iam sure as legislation looms & with Gen3 these bigger fleet orders with start coming in. Added to the market of oem supplied units.
These money in them hills Iam telling you there’s money in them hills :)
Meet full-year expectations.
Underlying revenue for the six months ended 31 December 2023 was US$25.6 million, up 28%, while recurring sales were up 22% year-on-year to US$14.5 million.
Seeing Machines exited the period with US$22.2 million in the bank, while the receivables and inventory balance was US$31.1 million, with an expected working capital unwind of US$5-6 million in the second half.
Driving this growth was a 116% year-over-year increase in the number of cars on the road equipped with Seeing Machines' technology, now surpassing 1.5 million vehicles.
Operational milestones during the period included securing contracts to deliver its FOVIO Driver Monitoring System (DMS) technology to new and existing European OEMs, with initial lifetime values of US$30 million and US$15 million, respectively.
This new business contributed to Seeing Machines' portfolio of 17 automotive programmes with 11 individual OEM customers with a lifetime value of US$366 million.
In the update, Seeing Machines said it and Collins Aerospace have initiated the joint development of the world's first aviation fatigue detection solution - a first in the industry.
The company's aftermarket DMS, Guardian Generation 3, has been independently verified to meet the European Commission's General Safety Regulation requirements for drowsiness detection, set to come into effect in July 2024.
This product was launched at CES 2024, where Seeing Machines showcased its technology to a global audience, facilitating 35 meetings over three days with a diverse group of stakeholders, including technology partners, regulators and investors.
Chief executive Paul McGlone said: "Looking ahead, the growing industry demand for fatigue and distraction solutions to support enhanced transport safety, combined with our market leadership position, production pipeline, proprietary AI technology and balance sheet strength, leave us well positioned to meet FY2024 expectations and cash break even run rate during FY2025."
https://www.proactiveinvestors.co.uk/companies/news/1040495/seeing-machines-on-track-to-hit-cash-break-even-target-after-strong-half-1040495.html
Colin said this at CES. So somethings coming for sure.
have seen it for myself at #ces2024. Here is the Magna International Seeing Machines #driver and #occupant #monitoring #mirror #DMS #OMS. That's me in the back taking the picture. In a Q&A Tuesday, Magna's Peter Spencley confirmed that the solution is fully compliant with Euro NCAP - For Safer Cars, Vans & Trucks 2023 test protocols for both owl and lizard movement detection. The occupant monitoring mirror was clearly installed in the ID.7 on display at the Cerence/VW press conference Monday, so must be due to go into production imminently. There's a second generation product in the works too, but that is Magna's story to tell. Based on what I have seen here at CES, this product is simply miles in front of everything else. If you are attending The Autonocast party tonight, come and ask me about it.
Everyone has to ask themselves do you trust Colin or the moaners & derampers more?
Brock
As Colin Said in 2024 VW has started. But BMW is really ramping up. Lots new models with idrive 8.5 & 9 with SEE in.
The all new BMW X2 and the first ever BMW iX2 @BMW @BMWM @bmwuk @BMWUSA The BMW X2 is the car that first introduced the vehicle concept of a Sports Activity Coupé (SAC) for the premium compact segment. And now the even more distinctive, even sportier and even more forward-looking second generation is taking to the stage. Significantly larger dimensions and a pronounced coupé silhouette clearly showcase in its exterior design the development leap taken by the new BMW X2. The worldwide market launch will get underway in March 2024
https://automobilemag.co.uk/the-all-new-bmw-x2-and-the-first-ever-bmw-ix2/
BMW equips Steyr plant for New Class electric drive production.
BMW has completed the new halls for the future production of New Class electric drive systems at its Austrian plant in Steyr and is now starting to set up the plant. Pre-series production is scheduled to start there in July.
Around 300 machines and production facilities will have to be set up in the coming months so that pre-series production can start on schedule in July of this year, according to BMW. In total, the BMW Group is investing around one billion euros in electric drives at the Steyr site by 2030. In future, the Steyr plant will produce over 600,000 drive systems per year – in parallel with diesel and petrol engines.
https://www.electrive.com/2024/02/02/bmw-equips-steyr-plant-for-new-class-electric-drive-production/
Considering October strikes in USA it could be worse. The serious bit started in 2024 now though.
We need great TPIs from here onwards but also need to start seeing some auto wins for the future.
With the likes of bmw ramping up & VW starting this Qtr the next 2 TPIs really need to start climbing.
Tech offerings are the same as what you'll find in the 5-series and i5 sedans, including a huge curved display screen on the dashboard and the latest iDrive 8.5 software with an in-car gaming platform. There's also an available hands-free driver-assist function that can operate under certain conditions on the highway.
https://www.caranddriver.com/news/a46671178/bmw-5-series-wagon-revealed/
Ford continued to build momentum behind its software-enabled services. Total paid software
subscriptions across all segments rose 8% sequentially in the fourth quarter to about 630,000.
During 2023, the company expanded availability of Ford’s BlueCruise advanced driverassistance system to Great Britain, Germany and Spain, a first in that country – in addition to
the U.S. and Canada. More than 290,000 BlueCruise-equipped Ford and Lincoln vehicles are
now on the road, with customer use exceeding 2.3 million hours and 156 million hands-free
miles – and counting
https://s201.q4cdn.com/693218008/files/doc_financials/2023/q4/2-6-24-Ford-Delivers-Solid-2023-Provides-Outlook-for-Healthy-24-Company-Declares-Regular-Supplemental-Stock-Dividends.pdf
Ford (F) assembled a “super-talented skunk works team” to build a low-cost EV platform. The small team consisted of “some of the best EV engineers in the world,” according to Ford’s CEO Jim Farley. It will be used to launch several new software-defined electric models.
Ford is “secretly” developing a low-cost EV platform
Following Tuesday’s Q4 and full-year 2023 earnings results, Farley explained that Ford is adjusting its capital while switching gears to focus on smaller EVs.
Ford’s leader said on the company’s earnings call that the company made a bet in silence two years ago to develop a low-cost EV platform. Ford put together a small team with “some of the best EV engineers in the world.” The project was separate from Ford’s main operations.
Meanwhile, Ford’s hands-free BlueCruise driving passed 150 million miles, up 25% from Q3. BlueCruise gross margins are at +70% as Ford doubles down on software-defined vehicles.
https://electrek.co/2024/02/07/ford-buildin-low-cost-ev-platform-tesla/