At the Consumer Electronics Show 2016, the BMW Group is giving the first insight into the prototype for a personalized digital assistant to support individual mobility: BMW Connected. This vision represents an intelligent, highly personalized world of digital services which integrate the vehicle seamlessly into the life of the user. Users and their personal and very individual needs are situated at the center of the services, irrespective of whether they are moving around with or without a vehicle. The approach to mobility adopted by the BMW Group with this digital assistant is radically new in the automobile industry. A wide range of different end devices are perfectly integrated into the networking system – mobility becomes seamless – and users have more convenience when they are moving around. At the same time they save time, money and energy.
Information is seamlessly integrated, anytime and anywhere.
BMW Connected supports mobility of the future with new services. This personalised and intelligently prepared content is always accessible at any of the networked touchpoints. These include the smart phone, smart watch, tablet, computer and all the connected end devices. In the smart home, for example, there might be an intelligently networked mirror with a display function inside an apartment. Mobility starts long before you get into the vehicle. That is why it is so important for BMW Connected to empower all the different digital end devices to provide bespoke access to the information needed to match individual contexts.
Personalized services, prepared on the basis of the user’s needs.
An important part of BMW Connected is universal integration embedded in all the vehicles fitted with BMW ConnectedDrive. This might be the user’s own BMW, but it could also be a vehicle from Drive Now or a BMW being driven as a hire car – all the relevant information is seamlessly accessible. Even when the driver leaves the vehicle, all the data are displayed on different digital end devices. BMW Connected responds to the mobility of the future which already starts long before embarking on a journey and by no means ends after leaving the means of transport. The vehicle functions can still be controlled remotely by smart phone, and information can be accessed. The vehicle now becomes even more intensively integrated as a component of digital life.
Personalized and context-sensitive services can be put in a bespoke structure to suit users’ needs if their individual mobility requirements are known. The BMW Group records data for this purpose, analyses it and generates an individual Mobility Graph for the user on the basis of the analysed data. This data includes favorite journeys along specific routes, regular traffic obstructions on the route or the opportunity to find a parking space in a given part of town.
A highly flexible service structure is necessary to achieve the vision of BMW Connected – the Open Mobility Cloud. This is a scalable system capable of learning which is based on data analytics and machine-learning capabilities. The intelligent system processes data and information from a wide range of different sources to create the basis for enabling personalization and context orientation of services. The learning capability of the system facilitates ongoing perfection of personalization and bespoke modification to suit the needs of the user, and this is enhanced with frequent use of BMW Connected.
Open Mobility Cloud can integrate content from third-party providers.
The open and exceptionally flexible service architecture of the Open Mobility Cloud permits fast connection of third-party content through standard interfaces. This content can be enriched by the individual mobility graph of each user, with targeted and tailored access being provided in turn – seamlessly across all digital end devices. The Open Mobility Cloud also permits integration in other networked systems, which transforms BMW Connected into a digital assistant for the user in the environment of mobility.
Journey Management – central component of BMW Connected.
Reaching your destination with the minimum expenditure of resources – fast, comfortably and punctually – constitutes a basic need of everyday mobility. Journey Management is therefore a key element in the vision of the BMW Group for individual mobility of the future. Mobility needs can be planned taking the current situation into account. There may also be a sudden need for mobility or arrangements may change at short notice. The solutions offered by BMW Connected are correspondingly flexible and this means they can support users in managing their personal mobility. Information on battery charging stations and vacant parking spaces or real-time traffic information are organized intelligently and they can then be accessed by users at the appropriate time. The learning capability of the Open Mobility Cloud allows places that are visited frequently to be stored automatically. Real-time traffic information can be used to calculate the necessary driving time for the commute to work or the school run for the user’s child. The information forms the basis for reminder messages to the networked end devices indicating when it is time to start in order to arrive punctually at the next appointment. This ensures that users are informed that they may arrive too late at their destination in good time rather than receiving the information only when they look at the vehicle navigation display.
Solutions tailored to a personal Mobility Graph.
BMW Connected is perfectly integrated in BMW vehicles. Travel destinations are one example of information that can be transferred from a smart phone into the navigation system, or current arrival times can be sent to contacts from the vehicle at the touch of a button. The parked vehicle can be closed by smart phone and the navigation to the final destination can be passed on seamlessly to a smart watch. The vision of BMW Connected highlights a wide range of very different mobility options that are intended to offer the user the right solution at the right time: personalised, context-sensitive and individually tailored to the personal Mobility Graph.
