SmartDrive receives patent for video-based event triggering

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Updated Oct 24, 2014

SmartDrive_ActiveSafety_graphic_high-resSmartDrive Systems announced that it has been notified by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office that a patent will be issued  for its application for advanced driving maneuver detection and integration with on board active safety systems.

SmartDrive, based in San Diego, says it has built an intellectual property portfolio of 106 issued patents and pending patent applications. SmartDrive is a provider of driving performance systems for reducing collisions and improving fuel efficiency.

The most recent patent that will be issued to SmartDrive is for the invention of triggering an event video when an active safety system is engaged or the driver executes a high-risk maneuver. These triggers were designed to target specific areas of driving risk that are not identifiable by traditional accelerometer-based event triggering.

Leveraging analysis of SmartDrive’s database of 80 million analyzed driving events, the company says this level of advanced triggering from active systems is more accurate at identifying collision risk through its open-platform technology approach that facilitates real-time data integration with other on-board safety systems.

SmartDrive says the advanced triggering capabilities improve the overall effectiveness of the program by identifying specific high-risk driving that causes the most serious safety situations for fleets. It also says it is the first in the industry to dynamically move the trigger point of the event to increase ‘pre-trigger time’ to 28 seconds in order to capture the complete maneuver or riskiest portion of the event, which is essential to understanding the root cause.

With following too close, for example, the 20 seconds or more that led up to the point where collision mitigation engaged contains the riskiest driving, but fixed event capture will miss 10 or more seconds of this time.

“We are actively investing in the development of our open platform, the data science that drives our predictive algorithms, and the technology behind our software-as-a-service safety program,” said Steve Mitgang, CEO of SmartDrive. “The market interest in systems that can take true advantage of vehicle ‘big data’ continues to grow, increasing the value of our portfolio.”