These systems will effectively be car-borne WiFi transmitters by which all the vehicles in an immediate area can communicate.
With a range of around 300 metres, such wireless local area networks (WLANs) will handle the communication 'around the bend' of stopped traffic, obstacles, and crashes.
"It will require a special communications device to be mandated for every new car," says Ford's head of the company's key research centre in Aachen, Germany, Dr Pim van der Jagts, who says it will need an 80-90 percent penetration to be workable.
"In the US this will happen very fast, when the National Highway and Transport Safety Administration (NHTSA) mandates the systems. In Europe it will be more complicated, it is very difficult to get all member states to agree and set a date for implementation."
An intermediate step might be to utilise the mobile phone devices already carried by 90 percent of drivers. But this wouldn't be as useful, both because of the larger number of vehicles in a cellular area and the delay through the phone operators.
"That latency also means that we can't use active intervention, like emergency braking without the driver initiating it."
Getting the WLAN system isn't really a matter of cost — the units might only add €100 euro to the cost of the car at current prices.
"And that could come down," says Dr van der Jagt. "We know that systems get cheaper once the automotive industry gets involved. What we're looking at now is how we can add enough functionality to make it attractive to customers."
He was speaking at a recent Forum on automotive technology and distraction organised by the Irish Motoring Writers Association in association with Continental Ireland.
(This is one of a series of stories we are running based on the 2013 IMWA/Continental Forum.)
