Researchers Submit Patent Application, “Detecting of Automatic Driving”, for Approval (USPTO 20220270413): Avinew Inc.

2022 SEP 08 (NewsRx) -- By a News Reporter-Staff News Editor at Insurance Daily News -- From Washington, D.C., NewsRx journalists report that a patent application by the inventors Adams, Randall C. (Malibu, CA, US); Barnes, William Anderson (Los Angeles, CA, US); Bentz, Steven Anthony (Simi Valley, CA, US); Combs, G. Edward (Agoura Hills, CA, US); Peate, Daniel R. (Thousand Oaks, CA, US), filed on May 13, 2022, was made available online on August 25, 2022.

The patent’s assignee is Avinew Inc. (Westlake Village, California, United States).

News editors obtained the following quote from the background information supplied by the inventors: “Traditional automobile insurance premium pricing is based on aggregated statistical historical data to produce rating factors. The aggregated statistical historical data typically includes an insured person’s driving record, credit-based insurance score, personal characteristics (age, gender, and marital status), vehicle type, garage location, vehicle use, previous claims, liability limits, and deductibles, among other information. Additionally, discounts on traditional automobile insurance premium pricing are available based on the presence of protection devices (like airbags or antilock brakes) in the vehicle, driving education courses taken by the insured person, and mileage driven by the vehicle, among other considerations. Furthermore, traditional automobile insurance premium pricing is a fixed cost, assessed annually and usually paid for in lump sums on an annual, semi-annual, or quarterly basis.

“Usage Based Insurance (UBI), on the other hand, typically individualizes insurance premium pricing based on the mileage driven by the vehicle as determined by Global Positioning System (GPS) location data obtained for the vehicle. UBI, therefore, attempts to more accurately price insurance based on actual usage of the vehicle, since there is a correlation between claims made against insurance for accidents for a vehicle and the mileage driven by that vehicle. Additionally, recent developments in technology have increased the effectiveness and cost of using telematics devices installed in vehicles, thereby enabling insurers to capture not just how many miles an insured person actually drives, but how and when they drive too. The result has been the growth of several UBI variations, including Pay-As-You-Drive (PAYD), Pay-How-You-Drive (PHYD), Pay-As-You-Go, and Distance-Based Insurance.

“The introduction of driver assistance technology, vehicle autopilot, and self-driving vehicles has generally reduced accident risks and claim and loss costs. Nevertheless, traditional and UBI automobile insurance premium pricing has generally not taken into consideration the risk and cost reduction resulting from the usage of advanced driver assistance systems (ADAS).”

As a supplement to the background information on this patent application, NewsRx correspondents also obtained the inventors’ summary information for this patent application: “In order to take into consideration driver assistance, autopilot, self-driving, or advanced driver assistance systems (ADAS) capabilities (referred to herein as “automatic driving features”) for adjusting a price of an automobile insurance policy, an insurance pricing system needs to have information indicating when one or more of the automatic driving features have been activated during overall usage of the vehicles. However, direct or explicit information indicating whether an automatic driving feature is engaged is not always readily available or obtainable from such vehicles or computer server systems (e.g., typically owned or managed by the vehicle manufacturer, the vehicle seller, or a third party contractor) that are in communication with the vehicles. On the other hand, vehicle operation data (e.g., any appropriate combination of a speed of the vehicle, a power draw/consumption of the vehicle, a heading of the vehicle, and/or a location of the vehicle) is typically readily available or obtainable from the vehicles or the computer server systems. Therefore, in accordance with some embodiments, activation of usage of an automatic driving feature in a vehicle is detected by a system or method obtaining heuristic rules that define a likelihood of an automatic driving feature having been engaged as a function of sequential vehicle performance. Sequential vehicle operation data is provided related to a trip made by a vehicle that has the automatic driving feature. The sequential vehicle operation data includes an indication of operation of the vehicle during a sequence of time intervals of the trip, and the sequential vehicle operation data does not include an explicit indication of whether the automatic driving feature was engaged during any time intervals of the sequence of time intervals. Automatic driving information is generated for the vehicle by evaluating the sequential vehicle operation data against the heuristic rules. The automatic driving information provides an indication of whether the automatic driving feature was engaged during a subset of the time intervals.

“In some embodiments, a system or method provides sequential vehicle operation data for a sequence of time intervals for a vehicle that has an automatic driving feature. The sequential vehicle operation data does not include an explicit indication of whether the automatic driving feature was engaged during any time intervals of the sequence of time intervals. First automatic driving information is initialized for the vehicle to indicate that the automatic driving feature was engaged during all of the time intervals. Second automatic driving information is generated for the vehicle by subtracting from the first automatic driving information a first portion of the time intervals for which the sequential vehicle operation data indicate operation of the vehicle outside of first specified operational ranges. The second automatic driving information provides an indication that the automatic driving feature was engaged during a first subset of the time intervals.

“In some embodiments, some time intervals are identified for which the sequential vehicle operation data indicate operation of the vehicle within specified operational ranges that indicate disengagement of the automatic driving feature, and the automatic driving information is updated to indicate that the automatic driving feature was not engaged during these time intervals. In some embodiments, some time intervals are identified for which the sequential vehicle operation data indicate operation of the vehicle within specified operational ranges that indicate engagement of the automatic driving feature, and the automatic driving information is updated to indicate that the automatic driving feature was engaged during these time intervals. In some embodiments, heuristic rules indicative of a high probability of automatic or non-automatic driving are evaluated after heuristic rules indicative of a lower probability of automatic or non-automatic driving.

“In some embodiments, some time intervals that immediately precede or follow a time interval for which the sequential vehicle operation data has been evaluated are treated the same as the evaluated time interval. In some embodiments, a relatively small group of non-automatic-driving time intervals (that is preceded and followed by relatively large groups of automatic-driving time intervals) is treated the same as the preceding and following groups of automatic-driving time intervals, and vice versa.”

The claims supplied by the inventors are:

“1. A method comprising: obtaining, by a computer system, heuristic rules that define a likelihood of an automatic driving feature having been engaged as a function of sequential vehicle performance; providing sequential vehicle operation data related to a trip made by a vehicle that has the automatic driving feature, the sequential vehicle operation data including an indication of operation of the vehicle during a sequence of time intervals of the trip, and the sequential vehicle operation data not including an explicit indication of whether the automatic driving feature was engaged during any time intervals of the sequence of time intervals; and generating, by the computer system, automatic driving information for the vehicle by evaluating the sequential vehicle operation data against the heuristic rules, the automatic driving information providing an indication of whether the automatic driving feature was engaged during a subset of the time intervals; and wherein: the sequential vehicle operation data includes primary operation data that includes received primary operation data received from sensors within the vehicle that detect physical operation of the vehicle.

“2. The method of claim 1, wherein the generating of the automatic driving information further comprises: initializing, by the computer system, the automatic driving information to indicate that the automatic driving feature was engaged during all of the time intervals; identifying, by the computer system, a first portion of the time intervals for which the sequential vehicle operation data indicate operation of the vehicle within first specified operational ranges delineated by the heuristic rules, the first specified operational ranges being indicative of disengagement of the automatic driving feature; and updating, by the computer system, the automatic driving information to indicate that the automatic driving feature was not engaged during the first portion of the time intervals.

“3. The method of claim 2, wherein: the first portion of the time intervals includes multiple interval segments; for each interval segment of the multiple interval segments, the heuristic rules define the interval segment, a preceding interval group that precedes the interval segment, and a following interval group that follows the interval segment; and for each interval segment of the multiple interval segments, the updating of the automatic driving information further comprises updating the automatic driving information to indicate that the automatic driving feature was not engaged during the interval segment, the preceding interval group, and the following interval group.

“4. The method of claim 2, wherein the generating of the automatic driving information further comprises: identifying, by the computer system, a second portion of the time intervals for which the sequential vehicle operation data indicate operation of the vehicle within second specified operational ranges delineated by the heuristic rules, the second specified operational ranges being indicative of engagement of the automatic driving feature; and updating, by the computer system, the automatic driving information to indicate that the automatic driving feature was engaged during the second portion of the time intervals.

“5. The method of claim 4, wherein the generating of the automatic driving information further comprises: identifying, by the computer system, first groups of the time intervals for which the automatic driving information indicates that the automatic driving feature was not engaged; identifying, by the computer system, second groups of the time intervals for which the automatic driving information indicates that the automatic driving feature was engaged, the first groups and the second groups alternating with each other within the automatic driving information; identifying, by the computer system, at least one group of the first groups that is immediately after a preceding group of the second groups and is immediately before a subsequent group of the second groups; determining, by the computer system, that a length of the at least one group of the first groups, a length of the preceding group of the second groups, and a length of the subsequent group of the second groups are within third specified operational ranges delineated by the heuristic rules, the third specified operational ranges being indicative of engagement of the automatic driving feature during the time intervals of the at least one group of the first groups; and updating, by the computer system, the automatic driving information to indicate that the automatic driving feature was engaged during the time intervals of the at least one group of the first groups, the time intervals of the at least one group of the first groups becoming part of the second groups.

“6. The method of claim 5, wherein the generating of the automatic driving information further comprises: identifying, by the computer system, at least one group of the second groups that is immediately after a preceding group of the first groups and is immediately before a subsequent group of the first groups; determining, by the computer system, that a length of the at least one group of the second groups, a length of the preceding group of the first groups, and a length of the subsequent group of the first groups are within fourth specified operational ranges delineated by the heuristic rules, the fourth specified operational ranges being indicative of disengagement of the automatic driving feature during the time intervals of the at least one group of the second groups; and updating, by the computer system, the automatic driving information to indicate that the automatic driving feature was not engaged during the time intervals of the at least one group of the second groups, the time intervals of the at least one group of the second groups becoming part of the first groups.

“7. The method of claim 6, wherein the generating of the automatic driving information further comprises: identifying, by the computer system, a third portion of the time intervals for which the sequential vehicle operation data indicate operation of the vehicle at a constant speed within fifth specified operational ranges delineated by the heuristic rules, the fifth specified operational ranges being indicative of engagement of the automatic driving feature; and updating, by the computer system, the automatic driving information to indicate that the automatic driving feature was engaged during the third portion of the time intervals.

“8. The method of claim 7, wherein the generating of the automatic driving information further comprises: determining, by the computer system, whether any of the second groups of the time intervals has a length that is shorter than a minimum length delineated by the heuristic rules; and updating, by the computer system, the automatic driving information to indicate that the automatic driving feature was not engaged during any of the second groups of the time intervals that has the length that is shorter than the minimum length delineated by the heuristic rules.

“9. The method of claim 8, wherein the generating of the automatic driving information further comprises: before the identifying of the first portion of the time intervals, updating, by the computer system, the automatic driving information to indicate that the automatic driving feature was not engaged during a beginning portion of the time intervals and an ending portion of the time intervals.

“10. The method of claim 1, wherein: the sequential vehicle operation data further includes secondary operation data; the secondary operation data is generated by the computer system from the primary operation data; and the secondary operation data includes at least one of: an acceleration of the vehicle, a jerk of the vehicle, a rate of change of a detected heading of the vehicle, or a rate of change of a detected power consumption of the vehicle.

“11. The method of claim 10, wherein: the primary operation data further includes generated primary operation data; the received primary operation data is generated by the vehicle and received by the computer system for a first set of the time intervals of the trip; and the generated primary operation data is generated by the computer system from the received primary operation data for a second set of the time intervals of the trip.

“12. The method of claim 1, further comprising: applying the automatic driving information to a risk assessment system to produce an insurance premium price for the vehicle based at least partially on how often the automatic driving feature has been engaged when the vehicle has been operated.

“13. The method of claim 1, wherein: the primary operation data includes a detected speed of the vehicle.

“14. The method of claim 1, wherein: the primary operation data includes a detected heading of the vehicle.

“15. The method of claim 1, wherein: the primary operation data includes a detected power consumption of the vehicle.”

For additional information on this patent application, see: Adams, Randall C.; Barnes, William Anderson; Bentz, Steven Anthony; Combs, G. Edward; Peate, Daniel R. Detecting of Automatic Driving. Filed May 13, 2022 and posted August 25, 2022. Patent URL: https://appft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO1&Sect2=HITOFF&d=PG01&p=1&u=%2Fnetahtml%2FPTO%2Fsrchnum.html&r=1&f=G&l=50&s1=%2220220270413%22.PGNR.&OS=DN/20220270413&RS=DN/20220270413

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