Traffic is blurred in a timed exposure on the Gardiner Expressway during the evening rush hour in Toronto, Ont. on Wednesday April 30, 2014.Ernest Doroszuk/Toronto Sun/QMI Agency Ontario drivers can now carry electronic proof of their auto insurance on their smartphones or other devices.Finance Minister Rod Phillips says the pink paper insurance slip isnt being eliminated yet, but being able to display the information on a phone can save drivers from rummaging through their glove compartments.He says there will be a one-year phase-in period, when insurers will have to issue a paper card in addition to the electronic option if it is requested.Phillips says the electronic cards will feature safeguards that wont allow them to be altered or edited, and privacy concerns are top of mind.Drivers will be responsible for making sure their phone can display the proof of insurance, even with a poor signal, drained battery or damaged screen.The Insurance Bureau of Canada says consumers have digital options in other sectors such as banking and retail, so auto insurers are pleased their customers will have the same
Origin: Pink auto insurance card goes digital for Ontario drivers
digital
Hot Wheels get a modern update with two new digital offerings
In 2018, Hot Wheels celebrated its 50th anniversary. Sales of the toy increased by nine per cent that year, despite the basic design of the miniature diecast cars hardly changing at all in five decades. This year, however, Hot Wheels is taking a leap into the future with a fresh new product: Hot Wheels id. The toys themselves look familiar at first glance, but flip them over and you’ll notice the difference. Each Hot Wheels id car has been outfitted with wireless tech, including a 4-MB memory card that gives each one a unique identification number. The cars have the ability to store performance data, like speed and lap info. There’s an app available on both iPhone and Android that needs to be downloaded and then the bottom of the car can be scanned on a smartphone to display and user data. Digital versions of the real life toy cars can also be raced in games built into the smartphone apps. Introducing #HotWheelsid, a completely new way to collect your favorite die-casts. Complete with a Spectraflame paint job, new wheels, and an NFC chip, your #HotWheels can now be digitized! Available at Apple and https://t.co/wMrq6pnNQP. https://t.co/fa4BN3Cjca pic.twitter.com/uv3iD4l3wW Hot Wheels (@Hot_Wheels) June 14, 2019 The cars work specifically with the new Hot Wheels Smart Track and its Race Portal, a digital surface outfitted with wireless tech that registers course information like speed and number of laps. While Hot Wheels id cars are sure to be a success, the toy giant has another digital play in the works. The brand is raising funds and interest for its new TechMods Accelo GT Gaming RC Car, which can be used both digitally and in real life, on an Indiegogo page. As the brand explains, its TechMods can lets you “experience physical and digital gaming with a buildable remote-control car that’s also a video game.” The physical toy car, which you build yourself, connects to your smartphone via Bluetooth, which then controls it. But the TechMods toy itself also transforms into a controller that can be used to control an online avatar.
Origin: Hot Wheels get a modern update with two new digital offerings
VW brand to trim as many as 4,000 jobs amid digital overhaul
A Volkswagen badge on a Golf GTI steering wheel.Nick Tragianis / Driving Volkswagen’s main car brand will let lapse as many as 4,000 general and administrative jobs while adding at least 2,000 IT positions over the next four years, avoiding layoffs at its German factories as it negotiates a major shift toward electrification and self-driving cars. The move, brokered with VW’s powerful unions, includes job guarantees through 2029, the manufacturer said Wednesday in a statement. The brand will rely on partial retirement and attrition to help reach targeted staff reductions as it culls models and focuses on new technologies that require fewer factory workers. With earlier job cuts, VW is on track with a plan announced in March to improve profit by 5.9 billion euros (US$6.7 billion) a year, the unit’s chief operating officer, Ralf Brandstaetter, said in the statement. “We are making the company fit for the digital age in a sustainable way.” The prospect of deeper cutbacks had alarmed VW’s union leaders as manufacturers wrestle with the transformation of sprawling industrial operations. App-based services like ride-sharing and car-sharing are already threatening the industry’s traditional business model of individual car ownership — a trend that may accelerate once self-driving vehicles reach critical mass — and electric cars require fewer parts and workers for assembly. The extended job guarantee is “an important signal,” VW works council chief Bernd Osterloh said in Wolfsburg, near the company’s headquarters. VW signed a broader labor pact in 2016 to cull 30,000 jobs worldwide, with Germany accounting for 23,000, to generate about 3 billion euros in annual savings. The VW car brand, which accounts for about half the group’s global deliveries, employs roughly 110,000 workers in Germany out of a global workforce of 663,000 across the Volkswagen group, the world’s largest automaker. The unit has been pushing to rein in bloated expenses to lift profitability that’s trailing rivals like PSA
Origin: VW brand to trim as many as 4,000 jobs amid digital overhaul
GM’s new global digital platform will underpin electric, autonomous vehicles
GM Digital Vehicle Platform GM unveiled its new all-electronic platform late May, the basis for its next generation of conventional and electric vehicles; active safety, infotainment and connectivity technologies; and evolving Super Cruise driver assistance. The company said these and other advancements are central to its vision for zero crashes, emissions and congestion, including an “all-electric future.” Over the next five to 10 years, vehicles will need more electrical bandwidth and connectivity to ensure all advanced vehicle features can run in conjunction with each other. The platform’s technology powers an electronic system that’s capable of managing up to 4.5 terabytes of data processing power per hour, a fivefold increase over the company’s current electrical architecture. Over-the-air software updates will allow functionality upgrades over the vehicle’s lifetime. The platform will debut underneath the 2020 Cadillac CT5, which goes into production later this year, and is expected to roll out to most vehicles across GM’s global lineup by 2023. It was developed at GM’s global facilities by teams of electrical, hardware and software engineers. For cybersecurity, the system includes additional protective hardware and software levels, and the company maintains an integrated team of experts that focus on protecting data, as well as chairing the Automotive Information Sharing Analysis Center, a community of private and public sector partners that analyzes intelligence about emerging security risks in the automotive
Origin: GM’s new global digital platform will underpin electric, autonomous vehicles
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