This 'connected car' comes with gesture control and Wi-Fi — and it knows if you're drunk

The Automotive Parts Manufacturers Association unveiled a “connected car” demo vehicle today in Windsor, Ontario, with built-in 4G, Wi-Fi, 360-degree proximity sensors, in-vehicle inductive mobile device charging, and gesture-based controls.

Hope you’re not a hand talker — you could find yourself suddenly in reverse.

“Dream cars these days are defined more by technology than by what’s under the hood,” a representative told VentureBeat. “This concept car is made up of hundreds of parts and components that establish a new benchmark for what a connected car can be.”

Above: Excuse me, sir, is that a server in your trunk?

Image Credit: APMA

For starters, intoxicated drivers won’t even be able to start the car. The car also provides dynamic directions and re-routing in case of accidents, much as Waze does already, and offers full Wi-Fi inside the car via a 4G LTE connection to your local cellular provider.

That’s right, you could soon be paying a data subscription for your car. Oh joy.

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Of course, hand gestures won’t actually put the car in reverse — that type of input is restricted to controlling the radio, cabin environmental features, and other non-driving components of the car. But internal sensors will be monitoring your body position, allowing you to make adjustments without having to reach across the car and search for the right button, switch, or icon. And those sensors may even detect if you’re falling asleep.

The car also provides advanced warning of ambulances, fire trucks, and police cars — presumably not those that are simply cruising at normal speed — allowing you to get out of the way of emergency vehicles.

Other features include:

• smart rear-view mirror
• side-light projectors
• driver and vehicle data platform
• in-vehicle smartphone charging
• a local interconnect network (LIN) ambient lighting system

The entire package is tied together by a real-time QNX operating system, Car2, which controls all the technologies and enables them to interoperate.

“The connected car movement is driving convergence of automative and technology ecosystems at an exponential pace,” a representative said.

Of course, probably the ultimate connected car is a Google-powered self-driving vehicle. Oh, and that gesture control? Google applied for the patent on that back in 2013.