The bumpy road to innovation for smart cockpits

After the rise of new energy vehicles, the concept of "software-defined cars" has entered the public eye, and smart cockpits and smart driving have become widely recognized future development trends. Due to its low implementation difficulty and easier perception by consumers, smart cockpit is becoming a comprehensive application carrier for various new technologies. This article will analyze the current status of smart cockpit technology from the patent level and study its future innovation direction.

User needs define a new generation of smart cockpits. With the popularization of smart cars, users’ understanding of the value of cars has gradually shifted from a travel tool to a “third living space”. The multi-dimensional human-computer interaction, the richness of in-vehicle entertainment information systems, and the intelligence of mobile cockpits have become important factors for users to purchase cars. key decisive factors. Vehicle companies and suppliers are constantly developing new technologies to meet the safety, comfort, fun and personalized needs of drivers and passengers.

The boundaries of smart cockpit technology continue to extend. Compared with traditional cockpits, smart cockpits place more emphasis on the construction of "platform + ecology". The cockpit is no longer an isolated travel space, but an intelligent mobile space that connects everything. With the deepening of human-computer interaction, network services, and scene expansion, smart cockpits Connected cars will be fully integrated into smart transportation and smart city ecology through smart cockpits.

Intelligent cockpit-related patents have entered a stage of rapid growth. As of the end of November 2023, my country has applied for a total of 51,376 patents related to smart cockpits. The number of patent applications has entered a stage of explosive growth since 2020. Vehicle companies, parts suppliers, communications companies, technology companies, etc. have made efforts to deploy in this field. , this increasing trend is expected to continue (patents applied after 2022 have not been fully disclosed).

Figure 1 my country’s intelligent cockpit patent application situation

Communication technology companies and vehicle companies rely on technological advantages to accelerate product layout. Among the top 10 applicants for smart cockpit patents in my country, communication technology companies such as Huawei, Tencent, and Vivo use system software and cloud services as breakthrough points to lay out the overall cockpit ecology and become leaders in the smart cockpit field; vehicle companies such as Changan and FAW From the perspective of software and hardware integration, relevant layouts are carried out with the purpose of improving the cockpit experience; as an Internet of Vehicles company, PATEO relies on its technical advantages in the fields of underlying software, operating systems, vehicle-machine interconnection and other fields to focus on the layout of cockpit platform integration solutions. Ranked sixth on the list. It is worth mentioning that PATEO has also formed a global cross-licensing agreement with Huawei, the top-ranked company, on related patents in fields such as automobiles and motorcycles, further consolidating the dominant position of both parties in intellectual property rights in this field.

Figure 2 Top 10 smart cockpit patent applicants in my country

The continuous enrichment of interactive functions has become the focus of the patent layout of domestic enterprises. The smart cockpit consists of three parts: cockpit hardware (systems and components), cockpit software (software and architecture), and human-computer interaction (interface and interaction methods). Among them, human-computer interaction-related patents account for 45%, becoming a corporate brand difference An important driving force for culturalization.

Figure 3 The composition of my country’s smart cockpit patented technology

Among the TOP10 applicants for human-computer interaction patents, communication technology companies still have a technology monopoly; PATEO ranks fourth and is the only Internet of Vehicles company among the TOP10, demonstrating the strong strength of its products; vehicle companies such as Xpeng and Hyundai have begun to pay attention The patent layout in this field, combined with driving scenarios, promotes the rapid upgrade of vehicle intelligence.

Figure 4 Top 10 patent applicants in my country’s smart cockpit human-computer interaction field

The smart cockpit has evolved from button-based operations that meet basic needs to electronic and even body-based operations. It is gradually supported by hardware and meets the personalized needs of users through multiple expressions of software. The cross-integration of multiple fields such as the electronicization of hardware in the cockpit, the integration of cabin control systems, and the multi-modalization of overall cockpit interaction have become a hotbed of technological innovation.

Figure 5 Intelligent cockpit integration architecture

The integration of the mature ecology of intelligent network platform technology and the functionalization of intelligent cockpits can provide a smarter driving experience. Based on the dual considerations of technological development and user needs, smart cockpits have transcended the stage of single-point intelligence and entered the stage of collaborative intelligence. Therefore, it has become an inevitable trend to use the cockpit domain as the entry point, combined with networked platform technology, to carry out cross-domain integration of intelligent driving functions and intelligent cockpit experience, and ultimately achieve "cabin-driving integration" high-level autonomous driving. Judging from the focus of the patent layout of the top 10 patent applicants in the field of platform technology, the cloud platform empowers smart cockpits to realize active perception and active execution of all scenarios inside and outside the cabin. Among them, OEMs such as Toyota, BYD, and Changan use sensing hardware as a breakthrough to realize the integrated interactive experience of some ADAS functions; PATEO, Huawei and other companies have not only deployed full sensing by integrating vehicle-road-cloud integrated cloud control platform In the cockpit, active interaction and active execution are required to improve higher-level autonomous driving, and it also focuses on the cultivation of relevant high-value patents. For example, in the "2023 China·Haidian High-Value Patent Cultivation Competition" that just concluded, PATEO was shortlisted as the TOP5 finalist for its high-value patent layout of cloud platform-related products.

Figure 6 Top 10 patent applicants in the field of platform technology in my country

The diversification of interaction methods promotes the comprehensive upgrade of user-vehicle interaction scenarios. Judging from the current patent layout of leading companies in the field of human-computer interaction, improving the accuracy and response speed of voice interaction is the focus of the current patent layout of major companies. Communication technology companies continue to optimize speech generation models from the perspective of combining speech with semantics; small Vehicle companies such as Peng and FAW mainly make relevant layouts from the perspective of voice equipment; among parts suppliers, PATEO has the largest number of patent applications for Internet of Vehicles, mainly in the field of voice technology applications. In terms of touch technology, BYD stands out and continues to innovate in multi-touch technology. In terms of gesture recognition, Huawei, Hyundai, and Changan focus on short-range three-dimensional dynamic and long-range efficient recognition. In terms of smart wear and visual tracking, the number of patent applications is relatively small, and only Huawei, PATEO and other companies are conducting relevant research and development. At this stage, voice, touch, gesture, vision and other interaction methods each have their own advantages and disadvantages, and it is difficult to completely replace each other. In the future, the development of multi-channel integrated interaction centered on voice will become an inevitable trend. Enterprises such as PATEO, FAW, and Tencent have begun to work on related The domain layout is expected to be combined with user data to expand into new application scenarios.

Table 1 Overview of human-computer interaction patent layout of typical enterprises

The development of cockpit domain control technology promotes the improvement of product integration level. The automotive electronic and electrical architecture is in the development stage from distributed to domain centralized, and the decoupling of software and hardware has become a trend. Cockpit software is no longer developed based on a certain hardware, and has gradually developed to support multiple operating systems through a domain controller to achieve centralized control. Among the top 10 patent application companies, 7 are vehicle companies, indicating that vehicle companies have begun to focus on self-research in this field. In the future, they will integrate cockpit domain control technology based on self-developed electronic and electrical architecture to improve product integration levels and meet the needs of User experience needs. Apollo Telematics and PATEO Internet of Vehicles ranked 3rd and 5th. They are mainly based on the vehicle-machine system and integrate cockpit functional scenarios to achieve personalized customization needs.

Figure 7 Technical renderings of the top 10 companies in the field of cockpit domain control