Huawei's thoughts on commercial use of Internet of Vehicles in the 5G era

Huawei does everything, but the Internet of Vehicles in the 5G era is Huawei's core business. How can it not do it?

The 5G era has brought unprecedented opportunities for intelligent driving (or autonomous driving). To ensure safety, in addition to the sensor fusion of the vehicle itself, industry participants are also trying to use the various capabilities of modern communication technologies to continuously accelerate the evolution of intelligent driving technology, with V2X (vehicle to everything), especially C-V2X (Cellular Vehicle-to-Everything), being the first technology to bear the brunt.

However, to make C-V2X truly commercially viable, especially to realize its value, the entire industry still needs to break through. Xu Changqing, director of Huawei's wireless Internet of Vehicles market, said: "We should use 4G in-vehicle incubation applications to increase the penetration rate of 5G in-vehicles, accelerate the industry process, and start commercial operations of Internet of Vehicles as soon as possible."

Let’s see how he interprets it.

Why is C-V2X hesitant to be implemented?

After several years of development, the domestic C-V2X industry has accelerated its progress and has reached a certain level of maturity. Standards and evaluation plans are being followed up. The "three cross-border" in 2018, the "four cross-border" in 2019, and the "new four cross-border" this year have more than 200 companies, including suppliers, and the C-V2X industry chain has been basically opened up. Since 13 OEMs and two suppliers released C-V2X mass production plans in 2019, 8 OEMs have landed and one plans to mass produce next year.

So why hasn’t C-V2X really landed yet? Xu Changqing pointed out: “There are still some problems in the industry: there are many demonstration areas, and although the ‘three-span’ and ‘four-span’ have been opened, the reason why we haven’t seen C-V2X being used on a city-by-city scale is because people are waiting for autonomous driving, which may only be realized in 10 years.”

He believes that the value of C-V2X lies in that it can be used not only in autonomous driving, but also in assisted driving (ADAS). C-V2X can improve driving capabilities and do things that autonomous driving cannot do. As for the current difficulties of C-V2X, Xu Changqing believes that the following questions need to be carefully considered and answered:

• First, the operating entity is unclear, or there are too many operating entities. All regions are developing C-V2X, and they all want to make a difference. There are many operating entities, but not many people use it, so the effect is not obvious.

• Second, the scale is scattered. Due to the support of policies, many companies are investing. According to rough statistics, there are nearly 100 projects of various sizes across the country. Large projects cover a prefecture-level city, and small projects cover a few stations. After several years, they are still in the testing stage.

• Third, the terminal penetration rate is insufficient. C-V2X was proposed in the 1990s. Since it is the only standard in China, how to increase the terminal penetration rate is the top priority.

• Fourth, there is no killer app. Technology is no longer a shortcoming. The key is how to find a suitable business model and use killer apps to realize value.

4G with 20 millisecond latency has great potential

At the current stage, in order to realize the commercial use of C-V2X as soon as possible, "Does the latency have to be 20 milliseconds? Does positioning necessarily require centimeter-level positioning? C-V2X testing can achieve a latency of 20 milliseconds, but does it need to be 20 milliseconds? I don't think it needs 20 milliseconds," said Xu Changqing.

Why do we say that? Because the classification analysis of basic use cases shows that some use cases can achieve more coverage with the Uu (operator network) interface. Previously, several latency-sensitive services were placed on the RSU (roadside unit) because the Uu interface did not have such a function. Now, the Uu port has made up for the shortcomings of V2X network coverage. With the optimization of 4G network performance and the expansion of high-reliability and low-latency 5G network scale, the V2X experience will gradually improve.

Uu port quickly fills the gap in V2X network coverage

In the process of 4G/5G optimization (currently mainly 4G, as 5G network capabilities have not yet met some requirements), LTE-V (my country's V2X technology with independent intellectual property rights) can basically cover all use cases. In other words, the current 4G network and the future 5G network can support C-V2X.

"Then, with the support of 4G networks, it will be easier to expand the scale of C-V2X. If we only rely on 5G, there will be problems. For example, 5G has been deployed in Suzhou, but not in Kunshan, and if it is not deployed at the junction, it will fail when we get here. If we use 4G, with the coverage of millions of base stations, it can be used even in the Himalayas," he said.

Don't wait for autonomous driving

Realizing autonomous driving is a long process. In view of the current requirements of vehicle-road collaboration for connection and positioning, many application problems can be solved by using C-V2X infrastructure. Xu Changqing said: "At this stage, it is not necessary to achieve all indicators according to the requirements of autonomous driving, because C-V2X can immediately play its due role in the assisted driving stage."

At this stage, people are the main body of driving responsibility. C-V2X vehicles can receive information from several sensors (cameras, millimeter-wave radars, etc.), which helps improve driving safety and efficiency, including C-V2X entertainment information. Information that provides valuable services can be charged, but charging does not mean that the sender must bear 100% of the responsibility.

"During the extensive window period of assisted driving, there is no need to pay special attention to performance indicators. We only need to see what the widest indicator is, what use cases can be met under this indicator, and what valuable applications can be incubated to open up the business loop, so that this thing can really run and everyone can have a sense of gain, whether it is 2B, 2G, or 2C, use this technology to truly solve problems in production, life, and work, rather than always keeping this matter as a research topic," Xu Changqing believes.

C-V2X Networking and Penetration

Huawei is discussing C-V2X networking with some operators. The first stage is the hybrid networking of 4G, 5G and RSU, the second stage is the collaborative networking, the third stage is the converged networking, and the final stage is to connect the terminal side.

C-V2X Networking Trilogy

On the terminal side, that is, the OEM, no matter which C-V2X T-Box vehicle terminal is installed, the biggest problem is the penetration rate. Although some OEMs are installing it now, the scale is limited and not all car series are installed. Fortunately, some OEMs are willing to roll it out on a large scale, at least some domestic OEMs have plans in this regard.

At present, the penetration rate of 4G/5G T-Box is about 50%. The industry predicts that it will reach 70% by 2023 and 90% by 2025. If any competent authority forces the installation of T-Box, it will become the standard configuration of vehicles. From this perspective, it is entirely possible to use Uu port T-Box to increase the penetration rate of industry pre-installation.

4G in-vehicle incubation applications increase 5G in-vehicle penetration

What about aftermarket vehicles? Xu Changqing said: "We should take a multi-pronged approach to increase penetration. Although aftermarket vehicles have a worse user experience than pre-installed vehicles, T-Box provides additional information, just like using Baidu Navigation. It is free, but very useful. If something goes wrong, we are not responsible."

As a commercial organization, we all hope that the number of users of our products will increase, so that everyone can feel a sense of gain and that it is valuable to use. If economic value cannot be generated, it is also OK to generate social value first, especially since the aftermarket installation is very simple, and each mobile phone is a terminal, and it is also easy to popularize.

After solving the problems on the network and terminal sides, the operating entity can devote more energy to breaking through the final bastion of killer applications and value realization.

Uu air interface V2X vehicle networking can lower the investment and operation threshold

"I think C-V2X has great value. Even in the assisted driving stage, detection of roadside probes and spilled objects are very valuable. So if operators focus on these valuable things, they will have the opportunity to open up some business models," said Xu Changqing.

How to achieve vehicle positioning?

Lane-level positioning is a common requirement for assisted driving and autonomous driving. Without considering autonomous driving, only vehicle positioning is considered. Vehicle detection in different lanes and the same lane is completely different, and the decisions taken are also completely different. In different lanes, if the front car brakes, the rear car generally does not brake because it thinks that the front car is not in front of it. Therefore, the decision of the car must be combined with the relationship between its position. The lowest level requirement for this effective relationship is lane-level positioning. At present, there are enough research results on lane-level positioning.

Almost all scenarios require precise positioning

Lane-level positioning requires reliable and accurate maps. However, global positioning is still missing in scenarios such as viaducts and underground garages. All current solutions, such as inertial navigation, vehicle-side multi-integration, and field-side positioning, are too expensive. Deploying radar in underground garages at such a cost places high demands on vehicles. These are all issues that plague the prospects for industrial development.