Robot car Martti ‘speaks 5G’

A robot car called Martii can now warn other vehicles of road safety issues.

VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland and Nokia have joined forces to hook Martti into the 5G network to do that.

5G-Safe is a project aimed at piloting new solutions and using experiences and results, also brainstorming new opportunities created by 5G technology and analysing any limitations.

Martti uses improved range to detect objects and share observations with other vehicles, taking it a step closer to highly automated driving.

The 5G communication is expected to improve road user safety.

“One of the solutions being tested now in the project is a Nokia 5G connectivity in Martti, which allows the car to send its observations to a server for analysis across a low latency 5G link. The data can be used to adapt the car’s behaviour according to actual road weather conditions”, VTT’s RobotCar Crew member Matti Kutila says.

5G-Safe project leader Tiia Ojanpera says the new 5G link is an important step towards the future development and testing of vehicle services using 5G devices, which are expected to become commercially available during 2019.

“The main benefit is the broadband uplink which enables collection of data from multiple cars to cloud service”, he says.

The new 5G services developed in the project relate to road weather services, road maintenance, automated driving and fast inter-vehicle transmission of 3D views.

VTT is using this to support drivers, road maintenance providers and the systems used to control autonomous vehicles. They require no input from motorists while driving, as data can be gathered and warnings sent to users automatically.

The radio equipment is supplied by Nokia as part of the telecom operator’s long-standing 5G Test Network cooperation with VTT and other partners.

VTT also showcased Martti’s mate Marilyn at the RobustSENSE event in Germany on May 16.

Martti is based on a Volkswagen Touareg chassis.