METHOD OF COMMUNICATION BETWEEN A VEHICLE TELEMATICS UNIT AND A CALL CENTER

• US 20120142367A1
• Filed: 12/02/2010
• Published: 06/07/2012
• Est. Priority Date: 12/02/2010
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: General Motors LLC (General Motors Company)
• Original Assignee: General Motors LLC (General Motors Company)
• Inventors: Przybylski, Matthew G.
• Granted Patent: US 8,457,686 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 455/456.1
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 65/1069 Session establishment or de-establishment
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/046 involving vehicles, e.g. floating traffic data [FTD] or vehicle traffic prediction
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/44 for communication between vehicles and infrastructures, e.g. vehicle-to-cloud [V2C] or vehicle-to-home [V2H]
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/48 for in-vehicle communication
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 8/26 Network addressing or numbering for mobility support

Abstract

A method and system of communication between a vehicle telematics unit and a call center via a personal mobile device identifier. The method involves detecting the presence of a personal mobile device at a vehicle, receiving a mobile device identifier from the mobile device, assigning the mobile device identifier to a telematics unit in the vehicle, establishing a data session between the telematics unit and a call center, and sending the mobile device identifier to the call center via the data session.

Claims

1. A method of communication between a vehicle telematics unit and a call center using a personal mobile device identifier, comprising the steps of:

(a) detecting the presence of a personal mobile device at a vehicle;

(b) receiving a mobile device identifier from the mobile device;

(c) assigning the mobile device identifier to a telematics unit in the vehicle;

(d) establishing a data session between the telematics unit and a call center; and

(e) sending the mobile device identifier to the call center via the data session.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the mobile device is a mobile phone.

3. The method of claim 2, wherein step (b) comprises pairing the mobile phone to the telematics unit using a Bluetooth connection.

4. The method of claim 2, wherein the mobile phone is a GSM phone and wherein the identifier is a mobile subscriber identity associated with the mobile phone.

5. The method of claim 1, wherein step (c) comprises replacing a telematics unit identifier with the identifier received from the mobile device.

6. The method of claim 5, wherein the telematics unit identifier is stored at the call center as a permanent identifier and wherein the method further comprises storing the mobile device identifier at the call center as a temporary identifier.

7. The method of claim 6, wherein the method further comprises step (f) receiving a call at the telematics unit that was placed from the call center using either the temporary or the permanent identifier.

8. The method of claim 1, wherein the data session in step (d) is a packetized data connection established between the telematics unit and the call center.

9. The method of claim 1, wherein the data session in step (d) comprises a data connection established over a voice channel of a wireless communications network.

10. The method of claim 1, wherein the method further comprises step (f) restoring a previously assigned identifier to the telematics unit after detecting that the mobile device is no longer present.

11. The method of claim 10, wherein step (c) further comprises registering the telematics unit with a wireless communications network using a process that includes sending the mobile device identifier to the wireless communications network for use by the network as an identifier for the telematics unit, and wherein step (f) further comprises de-registering the mobile device identifier from the wireless communications network after detecting that the mobile device is no longer present at the vehicle.

12. The method of claim 1, wherein step (b) comprises receiving the mobile device identifier at the telematics unit using a short range wireless communication protocol and wherein step (e) comprises sending the mobile device identifier to the call center using a cellular wireless communication protocol.

13. A method of communication between a vehicle telematics unit and a call center using a personal mobile device identifier, comprising the steps of:

(a) pairing a mobile device located at a vehicle with a telematics unit in the vehicle via a Bluetooth connection;

(b) obtaining a mobile device identifier from the mobile device via the Bluetooth connection;

(c) replacing a telematics unit identifier in the telematics unit with the mobile device identifier; and

(d) receiving a call at the telematics unit from the call center that was placed using the mobile device identifier.

14. The method of claim 13, wherein the method further comprises, prior to step (d), the steps of:

placing a data call between the telematics unit and a call center;

wherein the data call is established using a cellular communications system; and

sending the mobile device identifier to the call center over the cellular communications system.

15. The method of claim 14, wherein the method further comprises, following the sending step and prior to step (d), the steps of determining if the identifier is already stored at the call center, and if not, then storing the identifier at a database located in the call center.

16. The method of claim 13, wherein the method further comprises step (e) restoring a previously assigned identifier to the telematics unit after detecting that the mobile device is no longer present.

17. The method of claim 16, wherein step (c) further comprises registering the telematics unit with a wireless communications network using a process that includes sending the mobile device identifier to the wireless communications network for use by the network as an identifier for the telematics unit, and wherein step (e) further comprises the step of de-registering the mobile device identifier from the wireless communications network after detecting that the mobile device is no longer present.

18. A method of communication between a vehicle telematics unit and a call center using a personal mobile device identifier, comprising the steps of:

(a) providing a vehicle telematics unit having an embedded cellular phone that includes a subscriber identity module (SIM) used for communications between the telematics unit and a call center;

(b) registering the cellular phone with a cellular communications network using a telematics unit identifier stored in the SIM;

(c) linking to a personal mobile device present at the vehicle via a Bluetooth connection;

(d) receiving at the telematics unit via the Bluetooth connection, a mobile device identifier stored on a SIM in the mobile device;

(e) temporarily replacing the telematics unit identifier in the telematics unit with the mobile device identifier while storing the telematics unit identifier in memory for later usage;

(f) registering the telematics unit with the cellular communications network using a process that includes sending the mobile device identifier to the cellular communications network for use by the network as an identifier for the telematics unit;

(g) placing a data call from the telematics unit to a call center;

(h) sending the mobile device identifier to the call center over the cellular communications network for use by the call center in contacting the telematics unit;

(i) detecting that the Bluetooth connection has terminated;

(j) retrieving the telematics unit identifier from the memory;

(k) restoring the retrieved telematics unit identifier in the telematics unit in place of the mobile device identifier; and

(l) re-registering the telematics unit with the cellular communications network using the retrieved telematics unit identifier so that the telematics unit identifier is used by the network in connecting subsequent calls to the telematics unit.

19. The method of claim 18, wherein step (c) further comprises determining the presence of at least two personal mobile devices at the vehicle, selecting the mobile device with the highest priority to be used from a priority list, and linking to the selected mobile device via the Bluetooth connection.

20. The method of claim 18, wherein the method further comprises, between steps (h) and (i), the steps of ending the data call and subsequently receiving a telephone call at the telematics unit placed from the call center using the mobile device identifier.