GEElab PhD Researcher, Sven Krome – whose research is funded through an industry partnership with Audi, recently attended the Automotive User Interfaces and Interactive Vehicular Applications conference in Seattle (USA). As part of the conference, Sven also co-organised a workshop on UI autonomous driving - which attracted more than forty participants from a variety of backgrounds.

The conference is the premier forum for Automotive UI and brings together researchers and practitioners from around the globe. Some of the topics of discussion at the 2014 conference included novel in-vehicle services, models of and concepts for enhancing the driver experience, driver performance and behavior, the development of (semi) autonomous driving, the needs of different user groups.

Sven’s research focuses on how gameful and playful interactions can shape the autonomous driving experience found many connection similar researchers and the opportunity to connect with fellow researchers.

“The conference was great - with autonomous driving on the horizon research on ‘joy while driving’ has becoming more present. I guess that games and entertainment will play a major role in future automotive interfaces and interaction design”

Next year’s Automotive UI conference will be held in Nottingham (UK) of which Sven is planning to attend.