Cogosense Blog

Aegis Mobility's COO Brian Simmers recently had the pleasure of being a guest on the Peggy Smedley Show (www.peggysmedleyshow.com), the voice of M2M & Connected Devices, to discuss the use of technology to prevent distracted driving within the ecosystem of the Connected Car. The audio interview can be found here.

While car manufacturers have made great strides in making driver interaction with mobile capabilities safer and less distracting, the presence of the mobile device itself in the vehicle continues to be a major problem. The problem at a high level is three-fold: 1) not all cars on the road today, or in the near future, are "connected" with the high-tech features necessary to limit driver distraction 2) use of the vehicle controls is optional and 3) drivers are addicted to their mobile devices and the way they ring, ding, feel and look.

To truly eliminate the problem today, additional technology solutions are needed. This technology must automatically activate using flexible trigger methods and allow people to access the features that they want, but in a safe manner and in a way that they can't override.  In the future, the car itself can be part of the solution and we envision a world where the car can tell the network what devices are in it and whether it is driving or not, and the network can mediate the calls, text and data traffic based on this contextual information.

During the interview, Brian Simmers discussed a number of topics including the success of the Aegis Mobility FleetSafer solution for distracted driving due to mobile use in enterprises and our pioneering partnership with the State of Iowa and their TEXTL8R distracted driving software aimed at teen drivers in their state.

"These people are promoting death". Those are strong words but we would do well to heed the source. 

Nicholas Ashford is professor of technology and policy at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and his quote refers to the auto manufacturers' decisions to prioritize consumer desires for increased technology in vehicles ahead of concerns for safety.

Dr. Ashford was quoted in a recent Globe and Mail article describing the tragic death of Emy Brochu and highlighting that distracted driving now exceeds impaired driving as the greatest cause of death on our roadways.

Aegis has launched TeenSafer to help ensure the safe and responsible use of mobile devices while driving and Aegis is working with partners such as the State of Iowa and Audiovox to bring mass-market solutions to consumers.

Thanks to Kelly Wallace and the team at CNN for drawing attention to the distracted driving problem for teen drivers. 

While distracted driving affects us all, teen drivers are especially at risk due to their young age, driving inexperience and greater tendencies toward risky driving behaviours.

The New England Journal of Medicine recently published research from the Virginia Tech Transportation Institute (VTTI) and, amongst the findings, included:

Drivers who are 15 to 20 years of age constitute 6.4% of all drivers, but they account for 10.0% of all motor vehicle traffic deaths and 14.0% of all police-reported crashes resulting in injuries.

Aegis has developed TeenSafer to reduce the risk of distracted driving for teens … and entire families. TeenSafer automatically enforces the safe use of mobile devices while driving but also encourages the entire family to use safe-driving software through "gamification" of safe-driving reports within the family.

The idea as expressed by one of our partners, the State of Iowa Department of Transportation, is to create awareness and conversations between parents and young drivers. TeenSafer encourages a positive form of "peer pressure" and healthy competition within the family to ensure that everyone is driving safely.

Video is very helpful to animate concepts. This is especially useful for new products in new markets where there is not a mature understanding of solutions.

We've just released a new "explainer" video which provides an overview of the distracted driving problem for corporations and our solution.

Thanks to the folks at Basetwo Media for their great work in the video production!

Previously, I've written that "Learning Occurs Through Recognition Of Error" and we've authored numerous blog posts that deal with the challenges related to this precept when it comes to distracted driving.

For some people, numbers and analytic reasoning are compelling enough to force change. See the preceding blog post "2003-2013 By The Numbers".

For others, change is driven by an emotional reaction to crisis. Our friends at AT&T, Verizon, Sprint and T-Mobile have sponsored the creation of the documentary "From One Second To The Next" so that more people might effect change in their lives before facing their own personal tragedy related to distracted driving.

It is well worth taking thirty minutes to watch this compelling documentary.

http://youtu.be/_BqFkRwdFZ0