A recent Federal Communications Commission (FCC) filing by Norway-based wearable company focusing on smartwatches for kids, Xplora Technologies has hinted at global electric carmaker Tesla Motor’s involvement in the development of one of its products.
Even though the FCC filing doesn’t provide any information regarding the nature of Tesla’s involvement, but the firm could be working with Xplora to develop a smartwatch for kids which enables its driverless cars to pick and drop children to school without a driver. The smartwatch could be used to instruct the car where to go, while it will also work as a car key which can be easily handled by the kids.
Last month, Elon Musk told the Virtual World Artificial Intelligence Conference in Shanghai that Tesla will be able to make its vehicles completely autonomous by the end of this year.
“I’m extremely confident that level five – or essentially complete autonomy – will happen and I think will happen very quickly. I feel like we are very close. I remain confident that we will have the basic functionality for level five autonomy complete this year. There are no fundamental challenges remaining. There are many small problems. And then there’s the challenge of solving all those small problems and putting the whole system together,” the Tesla founder said.
Tesla’s current autopilot unit is an advanced driver assistance system that is classified as a Level 2 automated system that is endorsed by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. This means Autopilot also helps with driver supervision.
Autopilot is intended for use only with a fully attentive driver who has their hands on the wheel and is prepared to take over at any time.
Several third-party app developers have already made Apple Watch apps to control Tesla vehicles using smartwatches. With the current association with Xplora, the electric car manufacture could transition to using smartwatches instead of key fobs for Model 3 and Model Y as an optional key.
