Cogosense Blog

Cogosense's Driver Behaviour Blog

The Connected Car Still Ripe for Distracted Driving

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.

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Australia International Truck & Trailer show - Distracted Driving Solution Demo

Aegis Mobility's partner in Australia - Go Technologies - is providing product demonstrations of the FleetSafer solution at the International Truck, Trailer & Equipment Show in Melbourne. For those of you interested in finding a safe driving technology solution to prevent distracted driving, be sure to stop by the Go Tech booth @ GP51 April 5th & 6th, 2014.

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4th Annual Distracted Driving Survey

Aegis Mobility is conducting our 4th Annual Distracted Driving Survey this April for Distracted Driving Awareness month. To participate for a chance to win an iPad Mini visit the below link:

Take Survey Now!

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Over-Connected and Behind the Wheel: A Summit on Technological Solutions to Distracted Driving

This month, we joined Senator John D. Rockefeller IV (Chairman of the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation) in Washington for a day of meetings focused on the distracted driving problem and technology solutions.

In addition to Aegis, panel attendees included Apple, Google, Samsung, AT&T, Verizon, Sprint, Toyota and GM. The videos of the three sessions can be found here -

  1. The State of Distracted Drivingb2ap3_thumbnail_senate-seal.png
  2. The State of Technology
  3. Where Do We Go From Here?

Highlights of the day included:

  • Universal agreement on the severity of the problem
  • Clear opinion from Senator Rockefeller that industry, in pursuit of technology promotion and profits, may have placed responsibilities to society and safety as secondary
  • This led to good debate regarding the benefits of technology in saving lives (ex. OnStar) and the challenges of restricting consumers' choice
  • Senator Rockefeller gave compelling arguments that it is our collective responsibility to offer not just "what consumers want" but products that are designed for safe and responsible use
  • While there are many stakeholders with varying interests, it was clear that there is substantial collaboration within the industry to continually improve solutions and accelerate market adoption

The event was very useful to advance the dialogue amongst the key constituents responsible for providing technology solutions and Aegis applauds the Senator's leadership on this important topic.

At Aegis we continue to work with the leaders in the mobile device, mobile carrier, automobile and insurance industries to advance solutions. With our pioneering partnership with the State of Iowa, we are also beginning to deliver solutions through State governments.

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"These people are promoting death"

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

b2ap3_thumbnail_Globe-and-Mail.pngNicholas 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.

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