OREANDA-NEWS. Volvo Cars presents the next step in the future of connected cars at the world’s largest mobile and technology exhibition, Mobile World Congress (MWC) in Barcelona (March 2-5).

“Imagine a world where road status data collected by cars is shared with other road users and with local authorities through a connected car cloud such as the Volvo Cloud: A world where the benefits of anonymized data-sharing support convenience and life-saving services while helping to contribute to a better society. Volvo Cars is working on realising such a future scenario,” said Klas Bendrik, Vice President and Group CIO at Volvo Cars Group.

Volvo Cars is currently investigating a whole range of connected car services that could be provided thanks to available in-car data and the Volvo Cloud. Smart cities could improve traffic flow management by optimizing traffic lights and speed limits and by offering re-routing suggestions based on real-time traffic jam alerts. Real-time warnings of dangerous weather and emergency road conditions or of emergency braking by other drivers could be provided. In the future, smart cities could even use connected street-lights to illuminate slippery road-sections in another colour when detected by a connected car to alert other road users to dangerous road conditions.

Road Status technology has been developed over many years at Volvo Cars and is currently being piloted in Sweden and Norway with a fleet that will extend to 1,000 cars.

“If a Volvo car detects that it is slippery on a certain stretch of road, for example, it can make other connected cars aware of this via the Volvo Cloud so they are forewarned. Such connected car services could deliver both personal and societal benefits by reducing the potential for accidents and lowering the cost of road maintenance by making winter road maintenance more efficient,” said Klas Bendrik, adding “Car makers have the potential to deliver real benefits to society by democratizing anonymized car data. This is something that Volvo Cars feels very strongly about.”

It is another step forward on an exciting journey made possible by the evolution of the connected car in a connected society. In the future it will be possible to connect such innovative cloud-based technology with traffic management ecosystems in different countries in standardized forms and maximize the sharing of real-time traffic information data – not only with other cars but eventually with wider society.

Volvo Car Group in 2014

For the 2014 financial year, Volvo Car Group recorded an operating profit of 2,252 MSEK (1,919 MSEK in 2013). Revenue over the period amounted to 129,959 MSEK (122,245 MSEK). For the full year 2014, global sales reached a record 465,866 cars, an increase of 8.9 per cent versus 2013. The record sales and operating profit cleared the way for Volvo Car Group to continue investing in its global transformation plan. 

About Volvo Car Group

Volvo has been in operation since 1927. Today, Volvo Cars is one of the most well-known and respected car brands in the world with sales of 465,866 in 2014 in about 100 countries. Volvo Cars has been under the ownership of the Zhejiang Geely Holding (Geely Holding) of China since 2010. It formed part of the Swedish Volvo Group until 1999, when the company was bought by Ford Motor Company of the US. In 2010, Volvo Cars was acquired by Geely Holding.

As of December 2014, Volvo Cars had over 25,000 employees worldwide. Volvo Cars head office, product development, marketing and administration functions are mainly located in Gothenburg, Sweden. Volvo Cars head office for China is located in Shanghai. The company’s main car production plants are located in Gothenburg (Sweden), Ghent (Belgium) and Chengdu (China), while engines are manufactured in Sk?vde (Sweden) and Zhangjiakou (China) and body components in Olofstr?m (Sweden).