French-Japanese car maker Renault-Nissan Alliance has signed a multiyear agreement with Microsoft Corporation to partner on next-generation technologies for connected car projects. As per the deal, both companies work together to develop next-generation connected services for cars powered by Microsoft Azure cloud-based computing infrastructure.
The new technologies are expected to improve advanced navigation, predictive maintenance and vehicle centric services, remote monitoring of car features and external mobile experiences, a company statement said.
"Partnering with Microsoft allows us to accelerate the development of the associated key technologies needed to enable scenarios our customers want and build all-new ones they haven't even imagined. We aim to become the provider of connected mobility for everyone with one single global platform," said Ogi Redzic, Renault-Nissan Alliance senior vice-president.
The Renault-Nissan Alliance has been working on a number of autonomous car projects. The firm aims to roll out more than 10 vehicles with autonomous driving technology by 2020. Most of these cars will benefit from the technologies developed under this agreement.
The new technologies will help customers to customize their settings and they have the option to transfer the settings from one car to another, or lock them and disable transfer. Customers will be able to download over-the-air updates such as the latest autonomous drive software and collision-avoidance applications. Customers will be able to easily check in and communicate their estimated time of arrival to the destination. The car owners will be able to monitor their car from anywhere, through their mobile phone or laptop. The technologies will also help tracking a stolen car and it will disable all the next inputs.
