Smart Mobility isn’t only about automated vehicles
(it’s product development fuelled by free sandwiches)
by Tom Tompkin - Operations Manager at SMLL
When the concept of the Smart Mobility Living Lab was first pitched to the Department for Transport over a decade ago, there was discussion even back then about what to call it. Everyone agreed that it should, in essence, be a test track using the streets of London, to watch and record and check the performance of driverless cars (they’ve been so many things.... ACES, CAVES, CAVs, AVs, SDVs and NUICS, and there could be more acronyms to come). And yet, even back then, there was a reluctance to restrict the potential for a real-world lab to test just vehicles and their components. So the designers fixed on “smart mobility” as a catch all.
The downside of this is that we do get regular requests for the loan of disability scooters, zimmer frames, bath hoists and other ‘mobility aids’. (sad face).
The design team were prescient. At least half our work at the SMLL today has only an indirect association with modes of transport.
Take as an example some recent testing of a concept for an autonomous electric vehicle charging solution. Commercial sensitivities preclude us from advertising the client, but they brought to SMLL an idea on paper and we did exactly as we describe in our advertising: we accelerated their R&D. First we ran a series of closed workshops with members of our Innovation Community to discuss the concept, challenge its practical deployment and marketability and offer insights and opinions that would be hard to garner otherwise. This workshop is also a means to network with senior and influential people from across the transportation supply chain. An autonomous vehicle charging system isn’t something you can properly validate outside of a vehicle, so SMLL arranged an introduction to a vehicle OEM, who generously agreed to donate an off-the-shelf electric vehicle and assist with modifications to the car and its engine management system. The adaptations were made in the SMLL vehicle workshops and engineers from both the OEM and SMLL worked on devising an appropriate set of real world tests. What could have taken the SME literally years to do on their own, we helped them achieve in only a few weeks. Thus proving the adage ‘It’s not what you know... it’s who you know that counts’.
Other entrepreneurs have benefited from similar turbo-charging of their initial idea under the flag of the Zenzic Scale-Up Programme for SME innovators or via smaller grant-funded research packages from UKRI. SME’s are experts in their brainchild.... but no matter how good the idea, they are unlikely to get funding to build multiple prototypes, devise a validation process or run a public trial. They would have to hawk their baby around endless conferences and knock on doors to find just the right people to help them. Whereas SMLL has proformas for grant applications to use our workshop facilities designed just for this, and a monitored test bed perfectly configured, and a team of enthusiastic engineers willing to get stuck in and help solve all the little issues to get your idea on the road. Plus, by accessing the formidable expertise of the Innovation Community, every SME has the opportunity to formally present their concept to the wider mobility eco-system and receive undiluted feedback. The networking links via the Community opens doors into UK government, US government, local authorities, potential technology integrators and funding partners. And other creative inventors who have a solution in need of a problem. Members of the Community thrive on exposure to new ideas, and conversations continue long after the lights go out at our events.
This convening power of SMLL was baked in from its inception, partially inherited from TRL who own and manage the testbed. TRL’s mission is “the future of transport” and SMLL is a physical manifestation of this mission. TRL wants all transport to be safe, clean and accessible. The living lab in London and its Innovation Community puts us at the centre of the mobility eco-system, and provides links to reach all parts of it, no matter how fast and furiously it evolves in new directions.
There has been a dramatic swing in the last few years from thinking about ‘smart cities’ and ‘smart mobility’ as distinct things, towards an understanding that they are mutually entwined. Which has led of course to requests at the living lab to test things that are less about transport and more about how people live their lives in a connected and easy mobility environment. In some respects, the less familiar the concept, the more value an SME can derive from showcasing their idea as they get market research, insights and reality checks in half a day that would cost a fortune to commission.
V2X data is a hot topic right now and another good example of how the living lab is not just about cars. Yes the data comes from the road infrastructure, but it’s what you do with that data that gets interesting. At the lab we have assisted several SMEs with insurance related products explore how to get hold of and what can be done with additional data from outside the vehicle, if is available when there is a crash. The point here is that the testbed is not testing a bit of hardware or even a piece of software, it’s testing a process. And although the process relates to vehicle collisions, the outcome is all about making insurance claims swift and painless for ordinary people (nirvana!).
This ability for SMLL to reach parts that other networking organisations cannot is best reflected in the huge range of inward trade delegations that we host at the lab in Woolwich. We’ve welcomed groups from around the world – Holland, California, Nigeria, Korea, Australia.... there are pins all over our map in the office. They come with a huge variety of questions because they come to learn. But they also come to buy and to invest and make international trade links, and the smart members of the Innovation Community treat every delegation as a chance to pitch their idea and fill their pockets with business cards and promises of introductions to people “back home” who can unlock access to new markets and new supply chains. Its business development on steroids, with free sandwiches.
I had the impertinence to suggest that in the future when autonomous vehicles are the only vehicles on the road, we won’t need traffic lights. Oh boy did that raise hackles. But think about it.... if the cars really don’t need them, what are they for? Think of the energy savings if we turned them all off! This simple question is genuinely exercising the brain cells of very clever people who are imagining how else to safely guide people on foot or on other personal mobility devices around a city which has no controlled crossings. We’re looking forward to testing the solutions!
Save me a ham & cheese please.