The Pros and Cons of Smartphone Technology on the Automotive Industry
According to the CDC, “each day in the United States, approximately 9 people are killed and more than 1,000 injured in crashes that are reported to involve a distracted driver.” Distracted driving is defined as “driving while doing another activity that takes your attention away from driving.” Taking your attention away from driving can greatly increase the risk of an accident.
In a world filled with distractions, our automobiles are not immune. These distractions may involve talking on the phone, sending a text message, using a navigation system, changing the radio, eating a snack, and the list goes on. But cell phones are one of the top (if not the very top) distractions people face today. We have the world at our fingertips with smartphone, but when we are driving, those fingertips need to be locked on a steering wheel. The CDC gives a seemingly simple but powerful example of just how dangerous our phones can be: “Texting while driving is especially dangerous because it combines all three types of distraction. Sending or reading a text message takes your eyes off the road for about 5 seconds, long enough to cover a football field while driving at 55 mph.”
According to the National Center for Statistics and Analysis, 3,477 people were killed in crashes involving distracted drivers in 2015 and 391,000 people were injured in motor vehicle crashes involving a distracted driver. Many states are doing their part to try to prevent distracted driving by authorizing laws that ban texting while driving, and in some cases prohibiting the use of hand-held phones altogether.
The world of automotive telematics is also doing its part to enhance transportation safety and decrease distracted driving. With products such as embedded devices, tethered devices, and integrated smartphones, the automotive telematics market is generating devices and systems that can make transportation services better and safer.
At Stanford Telematics, we’re also doing our part to help companies across the globe to stay connected while also staying safe. In a world of smartphones, connectivity and safety are often in conflict with each other, especially when they are combined in terms of driving. But we aim to bring you and your company both. Technology can be used for so much good, and the main goal of automotive telematics is to find ways to enhance that good over the bad.
