Berlin-based car data company HIGH MOBILITY has announced its role as a Ford Neutral Server platform provider. The highly-anticipated collaboration will enable third party services and applications to access personalized data from Ford vehicles with customer consent via HIGH MOBILITY’s car data marketplace.
Accessed through the Auto API – HIGH MOBILITY’s single, cross-OEM connected car API – car data will be available for verified third party services for use cases such as pay-as-you-drive insurance, enhanced insurance, driver’s logbook and vehicle health. This personalised vehicle data will include GPS coordinates, odometer, vehicle status data and other vehicle health indicators to enable the increased accuracy and personalisation of car services.
Ford is an early adopter of the Extended Vehicle and Neutral Server concept. This process enables external applications and services – with the explicit consent of customers – to access car data. The Extended Vehicle process enables Ford to provide its customers with the opportunity to benefit from third party automobile services in a secure and transparent way. For HIGH MOBILITY, the announcement offers its global community of over 6000 registered third party services an opportunity to develop new services for Ford connected car customers in Europe.
The advantage for drivers of this collaboration is a seamless customer experience: drivers will not only have access to an array of third party data-driven and personalised services, they will also have access to these services without the need to install any hardware devices in the vehicle. In addition, the security of that data, thanks to the Neutral Server, is guaranteed.
The services outlined in the new collaboration range from insurance to vehicle maintenance. Pay-as-you-drive insurance services enable flexibility in terms of commitment and driving time as well as lower premiums for short-term or temporary users, while enhanced insurance services will monitor the vehicle status to further meet customer needs. Logbook applications simplify record keeping for managers and drivers, and vehicle health and maintenance services enable the seamless prevention and reporting of issues with the vehicle before the driver has become aware of them. Enabling access to vehicle data demonstrates Ford’s commitment to help make the driving experience of its customers as efficient, effortless and enjoyable as possible.
Users need not worry about misuse of their data; explicit customer consent is a key element of the Extended Vehicle concept. Ford customers have total control over which third party provider they allow to access their vehicle data, and for what purpose. Transparency here is paramount. The customer must consent to access requests by third parties and are free to withdraw their consent at any time.
HIGH MOBILITY acts as a bridge between third-party service providers and OEMs such as Ford, providing comprehensive tools and testing environments for developers to work with car data. HIGH MOBILITY offers these third party companies car emulators as well as the Auto API; the single connected car API they need to build and test applications for Ford vehicles. However, the Auto API is not limited to just one carmaker: it allows development teams to reach numerous carmakers and, within the HIGH MOBILITY platform, work with data from multiple manufacturers after just one integration. Finally, HIGH MOBILITY’s platform offers third party providers an open registration process with transparent verification, pricing and conditions.
