Hyundai to feature seamless integration with Google Assistant
Hyundai is now working on an enhanced remote vehicle voice command feature powered by Google Assistant via Hyundai’s Blue Link feature. In case that’s confusing, here’s the backstory – in some markets like the United States, most Hyundai vehicles come equipped with Blue Link which is a connected vehicle and telematics system that can, among others, offer remote control of certain functions to the vehicle owner.
This system has also been amped via integration with Google Assistant’s voice command capability. So for quite a while owners of Hyundais can instruct their cars – using speech – to perform certain functions. However, the voice command must also include specific commands to Blue Link. For example, it’s “Hey Google, ask Blue Link how much fuel the car has in the tank”, or “Hey Google, ask Blue Link to lock my car.”
The ongoing work for enhanced voice command negates the exact command to Blue Link. So, the previous examples will simply be, “Hey Google, how much fuel does my car have?”, and “Hey Google, are my car doors locked?”.
Even more interesting is that certain voice commands to Google Assistant can prompt a set of actions without using third party apps such as IFTTT (oops, almost went full nerd there). Best to tell you an example then.
So let’s take “Hey Google, good morning” – this command (to an Assistant-enabled smart speaker or your smartphone) can be set to trigger a brief of the day’s weather, traffic condition to work, or tell how much charge is in their Kona electric vehicle. Or indeed, warm up the engine and cool the cabin. Similarly, you can say “Hey Google, I’m home” and Assistant will turn on the house air-cond and open the garage door.
“Anytime we can make features better and easier to use for our customers we are going to do it,” said Manish Mehrotra, director, digital business planning and connected operations, Hyundai Motor America. “From being able to double check that their car doors are locked as they walk into a movie theater, or remote start their Sonata on a cold winter day using their Google Assistant device, we’re excited to bring even more helpfulness to our customers.”
Can we expect this in Malaysia? Not anytime soon, unfortunately. But you knew that. Hyundai is previewing this enhanced remote vehicle control feature at the Google I/O event that is wrapping up today in California.
