Ford and Qualcomm to tackle traffic with connected vehicles

Mandel Ngan | AFP | Getty Images

Ford Motor Company President and CEO Jim Hackett speaks during a keynote address during CES 2018 in Las Vegas on January 9, 2018.

Ford is partnering with Qualcomm to develop technology to connect cars to each other and to the world around them in the hope of easing congestion and adding other services for passengers.

Ford said Tuesday it wants to equip all of its cars with C-V2X technology — which stands for cellular vehicle-to-everything technology. Connecting cars to each other and to other devices, such as stoplights, can improve traffic flow in dense areas by coordinating the movement of vehicles.

“At its most basic level CV2X is a two way conversation,” said Don Butler, Ford’s executive director of connected vehicle and services, at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas on Tuesday. He added that the data collected from these simple interactions can be used to managed complex transportation systems.

Connected cars could be rerouted around cities to avoid traffic jams, barriers, or accidents, for example. They could detect that a driver or passenger is in distress, and take the appropriate action, Butler said. They could also receive signals from a hidden pedestrian’s mobile phone in order to avoid a collision.

Ford already has 700,000 connected car on the road, and wants every new car to be enabled with C-V2X technology by 2019, Butler said.