Cerence Receives Funding from Germany’s Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Energy to Drive Innovation in Automotive Assistants for Autonomous Cars

Cerence joins five fellow industry leaders in three-year program to enhance trust in autonomous vehicles

Cerence, AI for a world in motion, announced that it has received funding from Germany’s Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Energy and signed on as a member of the three-year EMMI (Empathische Mensch-Maschine Interaktion or, Empathetic Human-Machine Interaction) project. Cerence’s role in the project will focus on the creation of emotionally aware automotive assistants that increase trust in autonomous vehicles, a crucial element in the advancement of vehicle autonomy.

A Deloitte study of more than 2,000 German drivers showed that while 61% are interested in trying out new developments in autonomous driving, respondents demonstrate a fundamental lack in confidence in the safety of autonomous cars, with 90% reporting that they want to be able to intervene and take control at any time and 65% responding that they are afraid that autonomous technology is not reliable.

Recommended AI News: Accounting Seed Announces Reimagined Bank Direct Connect on Salesforce AppExchange, the World’s Leading Enterprise Cloud Marketplace

“As we continue to approach higher levels of vehicle autonomy, we know that trust will be one of the most critical factors in creating widespread consumer acceptance and adoption of autonomous cars. This is a challenge our entire industry is faced with solving together,” said Sanjay Dhawan, CEO, Cerence. “We are proud to join a world-class, forward-thinking group of innovators and work together to create an automotive assistant and in-car experience that helps move this important mission forward.”

Recommended AI News: Invitae Introduces Routine Exome Reanalysis to Help Patients Receive Diagnoses Faster

As a member of the EMMI project, a team at Cerence, led by the company’s emotion recognition expert Dr. Raymond Brueckner and UX expert Dr. Markus Funk, will focus on emotion-based technologies and their impact on increasing driver comfort, confidence and affinity for autonomous vehicles. Leveraging auditory emotion detection and emotion-aware dialog systems, Cerence will develop an empathetic and intuitive automotive assistant that can respond and give feedback to drivers with an unparalleled level of emotional intelligence and understanding, improving the driving experience and ultimately increasing trust in autonomous driving technologies.

Recommended AI News: Calvin Ayre Closes Investment in Bitcoin SV Experiential Reality (XR) Company Transmira