Ford and the connection between Drone and vehicle

Ford F-150 with a drone in the cargo area

Drones are becoming increasingly popular and are no longer used exclusively for military operations. The versatility of these flying devices is such that Ford, in collaboration with drone developer DJI, wants to drive innovation to create intelligent drone-to-vehicle connection software through the DJI Developer Challenge.

The challenge is to develop software that enables drone and car to work together. The challenge winner will receive $100,000. By using the Ford SYNC AppLink or OpenXC, the aim is to create an exploration system for the United Nations Development Programme that can access areas where even the most capable vehicles cannot reach.

This can be applied not only to monitoring and mapping the most affected areas after natural disasters such as earthquakes or tsunamis, but is also very useful for future applications that could include agriculture, forestry, construction, bridge inspection and other activities.

The base vehicle is a Ford F-150 that will communicate in real time with the drone, so that in an emergency situation the F-150 will get as close as possible to the affected area. Through the touchscreen of the Ford SYNC 3, the driver could identify a target area and launch the drone by accessing an app controlled through Ford SYNC AppLink.

In this way, the drone would follow a flight path over the area, capturing video footage and generating a survivor map linked to close-up images of each one. The smartphone also plays an important role throughout the process, as the F-150 could establish real-time communication between the drone, the vehicle and the cloud.

Data is shared by transmitting it to the drone, so the driver can move to another location and then be reached by the drone, which docks with the vehicle. The advantages are enormous, since space, height or terrain conditions are often a drawback for vehicles, something that poses no obstacle for drones when accessing difficult areas.

These kinds of mobility innovations are part of the Ford Smart Mobility Plan, a strategy that will allow the company to keep advancing in connectivity, mobility, autonomous vehicles, user experience, data and analytics.

Source | Ford