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Ride-hailing company Grab has launched a programme to make its service safer for drivers and passengers in south-east Asia. As part of the Safer Everyday Tech Roadmap initiative, Grab’s analytics tool works with the company’s app to help employees understand how to improve driving behaviour. Drivers also receive telematics reports on speeding, acceleration and breaking as well as reminders from a fatigue monitoring system on how long they have been travelling without taking a rest. Tan Hooi Ling, Gr

Redvision has released a wiper option for its Vega 2010 camera which it says removes dirt and water from the camera window. The PoE-driven wiper is concealed behind the front bezel of the camera when not in use. Stephen Lightfoot, technical director at Redvision explains: “Wiper power comes from the PoE-driven, CHAT interface board. This also provides camera, washer and built-in heater power to the Vega, along with audio communications. The Vega 2010 rugged housings are expected to allow installers to fit

Urbanova, telecommunications company Verizon and the city of Spokane, Washington, are collaborating on smart city solutions to tackle congestion and improve parking within the university district. Urbanova is a consortium of researchers and professionals whose stated aim is to make cities more sustainable through technological development. David Condon, mayor of Spokane, says Urbanova and Verizon will share resources around technology applications and data delivery to help achieve smarter infrastructure

Hyperloop Transportation Technologies has appointed engineering firm Dar Al-Handasah to begin construction of a Hyperloop system in Abu Dhabi in the third quarter of 2019. The project also includes a Hyperloop commercial track and an centre for logistics which it calls XO Square. In April, HyperloopTT unveiled an XO square centre in Minas Gerais, Brazil. The facility houses the company’s logistic research division, a fabrication lab and what the company refers to as ‘an ecosystem’ of global companies, s

The row about the employment status of Uber drivers has flared up again, as a trade union alleges that each UK driver is owed approximately £18,000. This follows a refusal from the company to accept a two-year old court ruling, says the GMB, the union which looks after the interests of professional drivers. The Central London Employment Tribunal ruled in 2016 that Uber drivers are entitled to holiday pay, a guaranteed minimum wage and rest bre

Verra Mobility says its pay-as-you-go tolling service can be used on 95% of cashless toll roads and bridges throughout the US without additional hardware, transponders or multiple accounts. Called Peasy, the digital platform is expected to remove the need for drivers to pre-fund tolling accounts or to submit payments by post. Peasy is available for drivers who have an existing transponder or toll tag account as well as motorists who do not have an account with a toll authority. Users can add multiple

BYD has delivered five electric C6 buses to the Ministry of Culture, Tourism and Civil Aviation in Kathmandu to help improve air quality in Nepal. The buses will operate in Lumbini, a Buddhist pilgrimage and UNESCO (United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation) world heritage site. This deployment is part of a wider initiative from the Nepalese government to replace 1,000 taxis in Kathmandu Valley, as well as school buses, with electric vehicles. Last month, BYD also delivered 12

Navya’s self-driving electric shuttle will operate as a daily mobility service for a planned city project in Abu Dhabi, the capital of the United Arab Emirates. The Autonom shuttle will link parking areas in Masdar City with its main podium. Navya and Abu Dhabi’s Department of Transport have customised the shuttle to mitigate the effects of extreme heat and humidity on battery performance. They also carried out health and safety tests to ensure the safety of passengers and pedestrians. Autonom can c

Australian Start-up Chargefox has secured AUS$15 million to build an ultra-rapid network of charging stations for electric vehicles (EV) in the south-eastern state of Victoria. The company says the chargers will allow drivers to travel between major cities. The EV chargers are expected to supply 400km of range in 15 minutes with a power output of up to 350kW. The fund was provided by grants from the Victorian government and the Australian Renewable Energy Agency. It also includes an investment from

Uber will introduce a fee of 15p per mile for all trips booked via its app in London to help its drivers purchase an electric vehicle (EV). The surcharge will be introduced in early 2019. Uber says drivers working 40 hours per week for two years could receive around £3,000 of support towards the purchase of an EV. The initiative is part of Uber’s Clean Air Plan in which the company expects to raise more than £200 million in the next few years to support the switch to electric. Uber estimates tha

Kapsch TrafficCom and oil and gas company OMV will deploy a Europe-wide cashless tolling solution for trucks. The OMV Smart Europe will be available in Austria and Hungary from November. The toll box, designed by Kapsch, is expected to extend the OMV card’s capabilities by allowing users to pay for tolls without having to deal with local toll systems or different toll boxes. Benedikt Hans, head of card at OMV, says the solution will aid the European Commission’s ambition to harmonise toll systems in

Teledyne e2v says its Emerald 2M sensor helps to lower the cost of a full HD camera system as it is compatible with low-cost 1/3” optics. The CMOS image sensor is optimised for machine vision applications and includes 5° chief ray angle compensation, the company adds. According to Teledyne, Emerald 2M’s global shutter and MIPI CSI-2 interface allow it to utilise image signal processors available for mobile applications. The sensor comes with digital functionalities such as multi region of interest, subs

Sony Semiconductor Solutions has launched a polarisation image sensor: 3.45µm, 5.07M-Effective Pixel with four-directional polariser formed on the photodiode of the image sensor chip targeting the industrial equipment market. In addition to the brightness and colour, this image sensor can capture polarisation information which cannot be detected by normal image sensor. This polarisation sensor can expand various possibilities in the industrial field such as inspection when visualisation and sensing are

Sony Europe’s Image Sensing Solutions (ISS) is showcasing its polarised category of machine vision camera at Vision 2018. The company says the camera’s IMX250MZR sensor captures polarised light in four different angles. The XCG-CP510 GS CMOS camera simplifies stress inspection, contrast improvement, scratch detection, object detection, removal and enhancement from a single image capture, the company adds. The camera’s module is expected to deliver 5.1 MP polarised B/W images at 23 fps, transmitted over a

Gardasoft Vision is showing the advanced VTS range of LED strobe illuminators at Vision 2018 to complement its well-established VCT and VTR ranges. The VTS is designed for use in ITS applications such as automatic number plate recognition, red light violation, open road tolling, multi-occupancy tolling and weigh-in-motion systems. The VTS is packaged in a robust, IP66 enclosure and offers an instantaneous power of 1.2kW. VTS strobes are available with a choice of infrared wavelengths for through-windscre

Kowa has released a new lens series for 12MP cameras with a 1.1” chip size and a pixel size of 3.45µm. The new FC series is optimized to fit the micro lenses of the new Sony sensors IMX253 and IMX304, so that unwanted shading on the sensor is prevented. The lenses are also wide-band coated which effectively decreases glare and reflection and produces a high transmission from the visible to the NIR wavelength. The focal lengths 8.5mm, 16mm, 25mm and 35mm are already on sale. The focal lengths 6.5mm, 12mm a

Framos is showcasing its IMX250 polarised sensor for precise spectral measurements and 3D demonstrations with Intel’s RealSense technology at Vision 2018. The company will also display a range of technology and sensor module scenarios including its SLVS-EC IP Core for Xilinx FPGAs. These products are part of a portfolio and services for using vision technology in ITS, traffic, mobility and infrastructure surveillance. Framos says the launch of its embedded vison ecosystem will allow its engineers to su

Lucid Vision Labs says its Triton cameras come with an optional IP67 sealed lens tube which allows them to operate in harsh environments without needing bulky enclosures. It comes with active sensor alignment to improve optical performance and a lightweight 29 x 29 mm size. Triton’s M12 Ethernet and M8 I/O connectors provide a robust connection, which is resistant to shock and vibration and is protected from dirt, dust, and water. According to Lucid, all cameras are actively aligned to help minimise

At this year’s Vision show, Flir debuts the world’s first industrial camera supporting on-camera inference. The new Flir Firefly camera combines the best of machine vision with the power of deep learning. At just 27mm x 27mm x 14mm, 20 grammes weight, and 1.5W power consumption, it is ideal for portable devices. Excellent imaging is provided with the latest global shutter CMOS sensors, the company says. And, Flir adds, with its integrated Intel Movidius Myriad 2 vision processing unit (VPU), users deploy th