The move toward plug-and-play.Those with long memories may remember the days when Europe and America battled it out over which standard for in-car networking would reign supreme, CAN or J1850. It wasn't long before the polyglot pol·y·glot adj. Speaking, writing, written in, or composed of several languages. n. 1. A person having a speaking, reading, or writing knowledge of several languages. 2. J1850 became similar to and supportive of CAN, which is something of a de Facto standard Hardware or software that is widely used, but not endorsed by a standards organization. Contrast with de jure standard. de facto standard - A widespread consensus on a particular product or protocol which has not been ratified by any official standards body, such as ISO, today. "This same process is starting to take place in the in-car communications space," says Christopher Cook Christopher Cook (born 5th May 1979, South Shields, Tyne and Wear, England) is a British swimmer.[1] His specialism is breaststroke, and took gold in the 50[2] and 100[3] , vp, Automotive & Industrial Business Group, Infineon Technologies For the raceway, see . Infineon Technologies AG (ISIN: DE0006231004, FWB: IFX, NYSE: IFX) was founded in April 1999 when the semiconductor operations of parent company, Siemens AG, were spun off to form a separate legal entity. . "Where this will end," he says, "is in a true plug-and-play standard for in-vehicle communications systems worldwide." Until recently, most automakers were pursuing any of a number of in-car communications protocols, looking for Looking for In the context of general equities, this describing a buy interest in which a dealer is asked to offer stock, often involving a capital commitment. Antithesis of in touch with. an advantage over the competition. However, the problems Faced by Mercedes when it switched navigation system A GPS-based electronic system in a car or truck that provides a real time map of the vehicle's current location as well as step-by-step directions to a programmed destination. See GPS and vehicle tracking. suppliers acted as a wake up call for those automakers still pursuing a proprietary standard. "When Mercedes recently recalled a number of vehicles because it couldn't retrofit the new system to early production vehicles," Cook says, "that caught the industry's attention." Suddenly it was less important for each automaker to have the best standard for its perceived needs than it was for them to have a single standard all could benefit from. If it was to succeed, there could be no melding of similar, but uncommon, protocols into a catch-all standard for the industry, as was attempted with J1850. You would think this might worry suppliers, as it would open the door to bidding wars that drive down the cost of in-car telematics and communication systems, but that's not the case. "It's true that an OEM (Original Equipment Manufacturer) The rebranding of equipment and selling it. The term initially referred to the company that made the products (the "original" manufacturer), but eventually became widely used to refer to the organization that buys the products and could use the standard to shop for the best price," says Cook, "but it also means there's much less of a possibility of either the OEM or supplier becoming tied to a proprietary technology that will become obsolete, or is difficult to upgrade." And that, says Cook, makes it more likely that both parties will become more willing to develop and adopt these devices since the price of failure is much lower. CAS |
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