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See the IDB Demonstration at Booth 21 at '99 SAE Congress

1 February 1999

See the IDB Demonstration at Booth 21 at '99 SAE Congress; IDB Puts Tomorrow's Technologies in Today's Vehicles

    WARRENDALE, Pa., Jan. 29 -- The three major U.S. automakers
are ready to demonstrate how a small, revolutionary device called the
Intelligent Transportation Systems Data Bus (IDB) will allow installation of
tomorrow's electronics in today's vehicles.
    A Chrysler Concorde, a Lincoln Continental and a Cadillac Seville will
showcase the IDB and some of its applications at Booth 21 at the '99 SAE
International Congress & Exposition at Cobo Center, Detroit, Michigan,
March 1-4.
    According to the Society of Automotive Engineers (SAE), the IDB is a
serial communications bus that allows multiple electronic devices such as
computers, cell phones, pagers and navigation systems to be installed easily,
cost-effectively and safely in any vehicle.
    New IDB devices "plug-and-play", letting car owners just "buy and go."
There will be no more need for complicated wiring and intensive installation
time.
    Operating on a peer-to-peer network, IDB devices can also talk to each
other, sharing information and capabilities.  For example, a pager could send
a phone number from an incoming page through the IDB to a wireless phone, so
the driver could make a voice-activated call.
    Roadside emergency assistance is another feature of IDB.  The driver of a
disabled vehicle can do a vehicle diagnostics scan to determine what is wrong.
Then the information and the vehicle's location are called into a service
vehicle that could repair the vehicle quickly and efficiently.
    Along with Chrysler, Ford and General Motors, other leading automotive
suppliers, electronics companies, consulting firms and research facilities are
participating in the demonstration.  They include AMP, CellPort Labs, Escort,
Hewlett Packard, Mitsubishi Electronics, Automotive America, Molex, Motorola,
MPH Industries, Oak Ridge National Laboratory, Safety Warning System, Shell
Oil, Strategis Consulting, Visteon and Whistler.
    The SAE Congress, the world's largest showcase of automotive engineering
technologies, runs March 1-4 and features more than 1,100 exhibiting
companies, including 90 percent of the world's top 25 automotive suppliers.
    For further information or to register for SAE Congress, call
1-877-SAE-CONG (723-2664); outside U.S./Canada, 1-724-772-4027; or visit
http://www.sae.org.