Karlsruhe (Germany) March 23, 2010 – The MOST Cooperation welcomes the latest research results proving that MOST150 is ready to support safety-critical applications and may be available as the future network for driver assistance systems. By supporting the new domain of driver assist, the latest MOST Technology completes the major fields of in-car uses such as entertainment, information, mobile connectivity, and connected services. “Today’s MOST is now exceeding the limits of infotainment,” stated Harald Schoepp, member of the MOST Cooperation steering committee. “Driver assistance functions are starting to complete and extend the feature set of traditional infotainment systems. Along with information features such as navigation systems, traffic information, and function warnings, the number of vehicles with driver assistance features like camera systems, distance controls, or lane departure warnings will be rapidly increasing.”
New Requirements Demand Network Update
The infrastructure for driver assist systems (sensors, networks and processing units) is fairly complex and expensive. At the same time, the technical specifications of such infrastructure for different application areas overlap to a large extent. Therefore, looking in particular at sensors and networks, it is inevitable to consider the requirements for active safety or pre-safe applications when defining such system components for driver assist systems. Consequently, a suitable network will have to be both high speed and high security. None of today’s existing vehicle networks fulfills these requirements completely. However, from all candidates, the MOST network is one that comes very close to the new requirements.
With MOST150, automotive network technology is ready to take this essential step beyond infotainment: Necessary improvements are being investigated and recent studies prove MOST to be prepared for safety-critical applications. Flexible topology options, new physical layers and protocol enhancements are being worked on. For example, the implementation of MOST as a sensor network can be the first step to move MOST out of the infotainment-only world into driver assist applications.
About MOST Technology
MOST (Media Oriented Systems Transport) is a multimedia networking technology optimized for use in cars and other applications. It enables the transport of high Quality of Service audio and video together with packet data and real-time control over a single transmission medium. MOST can use plastic optical fiber or electrical unshielded or shielded twisted pair wire physical layers, that meet automotive environmental requirements. Today, MOST is used in over 90 car models as the communication backbone for their information and entertainment equipment.
About MOST Cooperation
The MOST Cooperation is the organization through which MOST Technology is standardized and refined so that it continues to stay abreast of the latest industry requirements. Today it consists of 16 international carmakers and more than 60 key component suppliers. They have joined together to work with the MOST Technology and to contribute to its innovation. The MOST Cooperation is prepared to embrace efforts to further develop and standardize the technology for other industries and to establish the corresponding work structures. The MOST Cooperation was founded in 1998 to standardize MOST Technology as a global standard for multimedia networking. Audi, BMW, Daimler, Harman International Automotive Division and SMSC are its core partners and constitute its Steering Committee. For more information see http://www.mostcooperation.com.
