KT is going to supply its location tracking service called ‘KT Map’ to Tesla for its electric vehicles and is going to accelerate its partnership with global automotive manufacturers based on its competitive edge in 3.8 million cases of location tracking that it has accumulated.
It has been confirmed that Tesla released its electric vehicle called Model S (90D) in South Korea and selected KT as a partner that will be providing location tracking service.
Including Model S, Tesla is going to utilize ‘KT Map API (Programming Interface)’ for variety of location tracking services that will be provided to users of its electric vehicles that will be released in South Korea in the future.
Based on a basic map which is provided by KT, both companies are going to provide services that process and optimize variety of location tracking, which is used for functions of electric vehicles.
Auto pilot (partial self-driving) is a major function that will use KT Map. Auto pilot analyzes information that is obtained by a map and cameras in real-time and drives a car on its own according to conditions of streets such as reducing speed of a car when a car enters a street with speed limit of 100km/h. Although its basic function is to understand surroundings through cameras, accurate road data such as speed limit and areas with sharp turns are must as it is directly linked to safety of a driver.
Tesla is going to utilize KT Map for its main services such as charging as well. KT is going to update location information of ‘super Charger’, which is a charging station just for Tesla’s electric vehicles, and provide information through LTE network.
Not only does KT Map provide basic navigation functions but it also provides database so that drivers can search for necessary information right away from their cars.
In other countries, Tesla is using Google’s location tracking service for its electric vehicles. However according to South Korean laws, it cannot use navigation service from Google, which has its server outside of South Korea, and had to select a different partner.
It was heard that Tesla selected KT as its partner after considering experiences that it had had with KT for LTE network, a possibility of working with KT for charging infrastructures of electric vehicles in the future, and KT’s excellent data for location tracking service.
With this opportunity, KT is going to strengthen its partnership with global automotive manufacturers that are preparing to provide connected car services in South Korea through its competitive edge in location information that it has accumulated.
KT Map is based on highly accurate GPS-based map data and 3.8 million cases of information data (POI, Point of Interest). KT renews its map with most recent information through roughly 5,000 cases of updates daily while having its map connected to mobile network.
KT provided data from its location information to global automotive manufacturers such as Benz and applied it to safety services that are based on real-time location tracking services. Besides Benz, KT is also working with other automotive manufacturers about providing its data from location information.
“Our principle is not to disclose any information regarding our partners that are related to variety of services.” said representatives for KT and Tesla Korea.
Staff Reporter Park, Jisung | jisung@etnews.com