AI dash cams are fast becoming an essential tool for fleet operators, offering greater protection to vehicles and drivers as well as proof of events in the event of an incident or dispute. Expanding cloud-based vehicle tracking and real-time video streaming capabilities opens up even more possibilities for enhancing fleet safety and efficiency, but gaining effective insights from so much potential data and footage can be a daunting task.
Amazon has a solution developed specifically to meet this challenge called AWS Kinesis Video Streams, or KVS for short. Let’s take a look at how KVS works and the advantages of using it together with KVS-certified hardware.
Vehicle cameras have become increasingly important for helping fleet managers to monitor and optimize their operations, with dual-camera dash cams and exterior cameras providing a record of everything that happens on the road and in the cabin. This footage can help establish culpability in an accident, monitor driver performance, and even form the basis for driver training programs. Imagine a situation where a fleet vehicle is involved in a serious accident, for example. Ideally a cloud-connected AI dash cam could stream the video footage in real-time back to HQ, allowing it to be analysed, acted upon, and stored for later use as evidence in a legal case or a insurance liability dispute. This may sound relatively simple in theory, but turning such a scenario into reality is actually far more complex.
Harnessing Real-Time Video with Amazon Kinesis Video Streams
Managing such a high volume of live data from a distributed network of devices presents several technical challenges. Having video footage available in the cloud is great in principle, but what if you are supporting hundreds or thousands of fleet vehicles, each with a pair of HD cameras? If a manager wanted to quickly locate a specific piece of footage – perhaps the exact moment a serious incident occurred – the logistical challenge of finding that footage in the cloud would be enormous. This is where Amazon KVS makes its mark.
Kinesis Video Streams (KVS) sits within a family of Amazon services specifically designed to help developers manage, store, and process large quantities of data. As the name suggests, it’s built specifically to handle video streams and other time-series data, with additional services baked-in to handle the heavy lifting. It provides advanced video playback that includes not just AWS-backed storage of the footage, but automated time indexing, encryption, access control, and live on-demand playback.
Playback control and encryption in particular provide businesses with peace of mind. On-road video footage will inevitably involve capturing footage of other vehicles and pedestrians. Having secure encrypted cloud hosting helps ensure compliance with personal confidentiality laws, ensuring that only authorized employees have access to the footage.
KVS offers the advantage that it’s integrated with Amazon’s other services, and fully accessible through APIs that make it easy to retrieve, process and play video streams. It also works with any suitable AWS qualified device, so there’s no need to write custom code to handle different data formats.
It’s not just about access to video footage. Other Amazon services include advanced analytics that help managers to make informed decisions. Being pre-integrated with AWS Machine Learning and AI services means that video footage and data is ingested in the cloud with the means to implement intelligent interpretation, a much more advanced way of gaining truly actionable insights.
Technologies like KVS give fleet managers the chance to implement vastly more advanced analytics than previously considered possible. Companies can now integrate with computer vision analytics such as Amazon Rekognition Video, with libraries for Machine Learning frameworks such as Apache MxNet, TensorFlow, and OpenCV also available. With developments like these, I think it’s fair to say that the rules of the fleet management game just got changed.
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For fleets looking to implement advanced cloud-based fleet management solutions leveraging Amazon’s ecosystem, it makes sense to ensure that KVS support starts with the hardware residing at edge of the cloud. By selecting cameras and sensors that are AWS IoT and KVS certified, fleet operators are able to unlock the powerful technologies mentioned above, with minimal R&D overhead.
The VIA Mobile360 D700 is the first dash cam to complete the AWS IoT Core Qualified and Kinesis Video Streams Qualified program. In addition to dual 1080p cameras, GPS, and CAN bus support, as well as 4G and Wi-Fi connectivity, the device integrates Forward Collision Warning, Rear Collision Warning, and Driver Monitoring System AI features to further boost driver safety and situational awareness.
The VIA Mobile360 D700 features an SDK with AWS IoT Core and Amazon KVS live video streaming development and Android /iOS smartphone reference apps. It also comes with a 30-day free trial of the VIA Fleet Cloud Management Portal powered by Amazon Web Services (AWS), including 50 hours of live streaming with Amazon KVS.
Learn more about the VIA Mobile360 D700 AI Dash Cam here.
You can also find the VIA Mobile360 D700 AI Dash Cam here in the AWS Partner Device Catalog.
Learn more about Amazon Kinesis Video Streams here.
