Skip to main content
  1. Home
  2. Cars
  3. News

Volvo, Ford, win coveted connected car awards

Ronan Glon
By

Volvo Concept 40.1
Ronan Glon/Digital Trends
Volvo and Ford claimed top honors at the 2016 Tu-Automotive awards this week. The two companies were declared joint winners in the coveted “OEM of the Year” category.

The annual Tu-Automotive awards recognize the very best players in the connected car industry. Volvo and Ford tied because the judges — who included Jeremy Kaplan, Digital Trends’ editor in chief — couldn’t agree on a single winner after an hour of deliberation. Tu-Automotive explained that, on the one hand, Volvo was deserving of the award because its research covers all aspects of in-car tech, including safety, autonomous driving, insurance, V2X, and big data. Ford, on the other hand, deserved to share first-place honors for its efforts to bring tech to the masses.

Recommended Videos

Volvo also won an award in the “Best Active Safety” category. The judges hailed the Swedish carmaker’s Pilot Assist technology as “the most advanced deployment of autonomous features,” adding that the system is highly innovative. Pilot assist comes standard on the 2017 Volvo S90.

Related

The judges recognized Magellan’s eXplorist TRX7 as the Best Aftermarket Telematics Product/Service. Billed as a GPS for off-roaders, it won because it’s “a creative product that really hit the spot and disrupted an underserved market.”

Other Tu-Automotive award winners include PolySync (Newcomer of the Year), Security Innovation (Best Auto Cybersecurity Product/Service), and Veniam (Best Auto Mobility Product/Service). The award for Best Insurance Telematics Product/Service went to AXA Global Direct France’s YouDrive program, which was judged to be both ambitious and innovative.

Read more: For a fatality-free future, Volvo wants you to take your hands off the wheel

Finally, Julia Steyn, General Motors’ vice president of urban mobility programs, was named Influencer of the Year. The judges indicated that she won the award for boldly embracing car-sharing. Notably, she leads the team in charge of Maven, GM’s recently-established ride-sharing service.

A full list of this year’s award recipients is available on the Tu-Automotive awards’ official website.

Editors' Recommendations

Topics
Ronan Glon
Ronan Glon
Contributor
Ronan Glon is an American automotive and tech journalist based in southern France. As a long-time contributor to Digital…
Ford reveals the vehicle destined for its autonomous-car services
ford reveals the car destined for its autonomous services vehicle

A Fourth-Generation Self-Driving Test Vehicle from Ford and Argo AI | Innovation | Ford

Ford has unveiled its fourth-generation autonomous test vehicle as it moves toward the launch of commercial services using the technology.

Read more
Ford releases self-driving car data to encourage further research
ford releases self driving car data to researchers

Ford's self-driving car program is experiencing delays, but the automaker hopes that others will pick up the baton. Ford is releasing what it calls a "comprehensive self-driving vehicle dataset" to researchers. The goal is to promote further research and development of autonomous driving tech, Tony Lockwood, Ford autonomous vehicle manager, said in a blog post.

The package comprises data from multiple test vehicles operating in Detroit, collected over a one-year span, Lockwood said. The testing that generated this data was separate from work Ford is doing with Argo A.I. to develop a production-ready autonomous driving system, Lockwood noted.

Read more
Ford can use your voice to make your car’s wheels theftproof
ford can use your voice to make cars wheels theft proof wheel

Ford is developing an interesting new process that should reduce the chance of you finding your car perched on a set of bricks with all of its wheels missing.

The American automaker says that overall improvements in vehicle security have prompted thieves to target car parts instead. Including those valuable alloy wheels. It says that while locking wheel nuts can offer some protection, they’re not invulnerable. With that in mind, it’s created a unique, 3D-printed locking wheel nut that features contours based on the driver’s voice.

Read more