AttentionAssist

Mercedes Benz is a company that is known for high quality products, and most importantly a safe product. The safety engineers at MB have created a new safety innovation, known as AttentionAssist.  The underlying principle of why Mercedes developed the system is to help reduce deaths related to driver drowsiness.  According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration estimates that over 100,000 accidents per year are related to driver drowsiness, and it estimates at 1,500 deaths result.  AttentionAssist is a brave new step for Mercedes Benz, as it tries to battle the numbers.  Many automotive engineers have tried to use camera mounted in the dash to measure eyelid movement, and other eye functions.  There are a lot of problems with that, because if a driver is wearing sunglasses or glasses, the camera might produce an incorrect image of the eye.

MB took a different approach, and based it around a person's steering.  It uses 70 sensors to measure how you are steering.  It specifically looks for slow swerving and multiple jerky maneuvers with the steering wheel.  It also factors how long the car has been driving.  A person that has been driving for 15 minutes and makes an abrupt change is steering, will not set the sensor off.  Rather, it is the person that has been driving for multiple hours and has made multiple jerky maneuvers of the steering column.  Throughout the trip it also measures driver behavior, and adapts to the way that you drive, but if your driving habits change in course, AttentionAssist will still activate.  In the event that the system decides that it is time for a nap, an audible warning and a display on the vehicle's VDO that reads: "Attention Assist!  Time for a break?"  A virtual cup of coffee is also shown.

It was introduced on the 2010 E-Class Sedan/Coupe/Convertible/Wagon, as well as the 2010 S-Class Sedan (all models), as a standard feature.  By 2013 Mercedes Benz will have AttentionAssist as a standard option in all vehicles.  It will be interesting to see over time how the numbers published by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration will change, and if Mercedes Benz's investment into the technology was really worth the cost for R&D.