Electric vehicles – the automotive future

Owners of electric vehicles are often concerned about the charge state of their vehicle’s batteries – a condition known as range anxiety.

But leaving the office to check the charge status of the car in the basement car park every hour prior to leaving for the evening is not practicable.  So remote telemetry to either a web-site or more likely the user’s phone is a clear requirement.

A leading developer of electric vehicles approached Eseye requesting assistance to integrate telemetry into their vehicle management system.  This would not only provide the battery monitoring capability, but would also provide valuable feedback to the manufacturer of performance and driver usage.

Furthermore also suggested that pre-conditioning of the vehicle be considered.  This would enable the driver to remotely activate demisting and seat warming on a cold winter’s morning.  Most importantly, this energy intensive task whilst the vehicle was still on grid would ensure maximum battery charge at the beginning of the journey – reducing range anxiety.

Not only did Eseye successfully design the integrated mobile module, it worked with the developers of the management system itself to minimise the data sent over the mobile network.  For example the standard message sent the Vehicle Identification Number (VIN) with every message.  By using Eseye's Serval solution, this did not need to be sent at all, as Serval would automatically append this to any message as Eseye's servers now from which SIM the message has originated. 

For some message types this reduced the data transmitted by two-thirds.

Eseye therefore delivered additional functionality at reduced cost, and is now working to features, such as remote headlight flash to aid location in a car park.