To Make Connected Mobility Work, Give the People Control Over Their Data
By Peter Busch, Product Owner for Distributed Ledger Technologies (Mobility) at Robert Bosch GmbH, and Leonard Dorlöchter, co-founder of peaq
Imagine cruising through the morning traffic on your way to work. You lose your focus for a second as a flashy billboard catches your eye. Suddenly, the vehicle ahead of you brakes to avoid a reckless driver. Your car slows down on its own, winning you another precious moment to avoid collision.
This fortunate recovery was possible because of the sensors in your vehicle, which were tracking the traffic ahead. Just as crucial was the algorithm that turned the raw data of that video feed into machine-readable insights, identifying the danger ahead and triggering the appropriate response. This system, which spared you a crash and possibly your life, is just one of the many components making up the digital nervous system of a modern vehicle, a computer on wheels outfitted with all sorts of sensors and control chips. As much of a blessing this digitalization has been for mobility, its implementation often leaves room for improvement.
The fragmentation trap
As vehicles get smarter, our transport space also grows more fragmented between various service providers, digital platforms, and ego-systems – systems meant to keep the user locked to one specific vendor through proprietary hardware and siloed digital platforms.
The fragmentation trap is most visible in the electrical vehicle industry, which is growing its share in the overall transport market. In the EU, there is vast legislative backing for electric vehicles (EVs), but the industry is still struggling to overcome its interoperability challenges. As an example, the lack of standardization in the EV industry means drivers often have to search for a public charging point compatible with their specific vehicle, not just the nearest or most convenient one.
This interoperability challenge hinders the growth of EV infrastructure availability and feeds the range anxiety problem, where drivers worry that they will be stranded with dead batteries on long trips. A lack of EV infrastructure due to poor data management is hurting the industry and the planet.
Manufacturers in the mobility space understand that data is the key to unlocking a vast array of new business models and opportunities. However, when setting up their own data operations, they often rely on the very infrastructure that most of the Internet already runs on – self-interested third parties with little incentive to keep data communication interests close to heart.
For drivers, a lack of data communication means more than having to set up dozens of accounts with different EV charging service providers. It means that more and more Big Tech companies will be collecting and monetizing drivers’ data, a privacy erosion that is incompatible with European values, and, extrapolated into the future, threatens to further destabilize our societies.
Data is the key, but it has to be user-owned
As all of these data management problems compound, the need for a vendor-neutral digital infrastructure becomes clear. This solution would give all industry stakeholders a shared foundation on which to build their business without fear of falling into a vendor lock-in, and it would expand drivers’ access to EV infrastructure in an open market that lives and breathes interoperability.
Self-Sovereign Data and Self-Sovereign Machine Identities (SSMIs) – machine IDs that work in a peer-to-peer way instead of relying on a central database – are the crucial foundation of this paradigm. By giving users back the ownership over their data, they put the industry on track for a more privacy-focused approach. Furthermore, they enable real interoperability by bringing the siloed services on a shared and neutral infrastructure, functioning without an abundance of centralized user databases. Businesses get the security and independence they need, while drivers and vehicles become data owners, not data points.
SSMIs enable smooth and secure peer-to-peer interactions between the vehicles and the connected data infrastructure around them. They power applications such as EVs themselves paying for charging sessions from their own wallets. SSMIs will also provide the basis for integrating the mobility sector into the wider smart city infrastructure, establishing a communications standard between smart devices powering our day-to-day routines - without having to give up our security and privacy.
From the cloud to the edge
Besides Self-Sovereign Identities for drivers and vehicles, the future of mobility will be defined by edge computing, an approach that moves the number-crunching from a cloud environment to the local device. Instead of collecting data from thousands of vehicles in real-time to run computations on it in a third-party data center, companies must leverage on-board capacities to run these computations on-edge and only source in the outputs. Besides making for more decentralized networks, this approach would unlock new business models, such as SSMI-based data and computation marketplaces, and architectural decisions, such as the expansion of federated machine learning algorithms. Edge computing will enable better communication between mobility ecosystems and other connected spaces, such as smart power grids and smart city networks, resulting in seamless systems working as organic wholes.
For consumers, including EV drivers, this will result in a fairer, non-discriminatory market for mobility services offering them a wider choice of options for charging infrastructure and other products. Furthermore, with SSMIs, drivers will be able to take a more active role in the data market while still enjoying a higher degree of privacy. Imagine buying an algorithm that will process the video feed from your car locally, with no remote Big Tech data centers involved. You could profit off of the anonymized insights on road conditions that your car produces and sell that data to the local authorities. With SSMIs, such services are already becoming reality.
The future of digitized mobility is replete with opportunity for businesses. It offers drivers more features and accessibility for EVs, granting our society a hope for a cleaner and more sustainable world. Bringing this future to life is a matter of reclaiming data sovereignty and breaking down the silos of Big Tech data profiteering. Collaborations between government, top industry names and leading startups in the blockchain space are a critical condition for success in this transformation, and as such initiatives yield the first fruits, the prospect of a smarter, more agile and decentralized mobility space grows more and more tangible.
About the Authors
Peter Busch is the Product Owner for Distributed Ledger Technologies (Mobility) at Robert Bosch GmbH working for the Bosch Mobility Think Tank, which reports to the Board of Management of the Bosch Group. He and his team are working on the future Connectivity Strategies for the Mobility Business Units of the Bosch Group and as consultants for the Executive Board. He has 25+ years of experience in international project management, coaching and training in SW/HW development. He received his degree in computer science and business administration from the University of Mannheim and worked for his own Startups, JP Morgan, Sun Microsystems and the BOSCH Group.
Leonard Dorlöchter is an entrepreneur who co-founded peaq, a blockchain network powering decentralized applications for vehicles, robots, and devices. Leonard has built multiple organizations, teams, and products during his five years in the blockchain space. He operates at the intersection between business and engineering. He enjoys building disruptive products and ecosystems.
The views and opinions expressed herein are the views and opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of Nasdaq, Inc.