Draper Inventors Honored for Driver Assistance Technology that Can ‘See’ Pedestrians

CAMBRIDGE, MA—Draper has earned a prestigious recognition for its patent of a cellphone data detection technology that shows promise for reducing pedestrian traffic accidents. Carmakers, urban planners and mobile phone companies may benefit when this system is installed in cars and trucks. 

The achievement was recognized as a featured honoree by the Boston Patent Law Association at its 11th Annual Invented Here! event Nov. 12, 2021, from among more than 50 nominated patents.

Draper’s cellphone data detection technology, dubbed PathScout, is among the first of its kind intended to address the complexity of pedestrian protection systems. The software aims to equip drivers with a system to alert them to nearby pedestrians when it detects location and movement data emitted by their mobile phones.

PathScout can detect the location and predict the path of a person using a cellphone who may not be in the line of sight of a human driver or various perception sensors including cameras, RADAR and LiDAR. The system can warn drivers of a potential collision between their vehicle and vulnerable road users based on cellphone signals.

PathScout adds a new kind of data to the advanced driver-assistance systems that augment many vehicles’ onboard sensors and intelligence, according to Troy Jones, a Draper engineer on the PathScout team.

The inventors responsible for the patent “Enhancing Autonomous Vehicle Perception with Off-Vehicle Collected Data” are Fei Sun, Jones and Scott Lennox. The patent application was prepared and prosecuted by Hamilton, Brook, Smith & Reynolds, P.C.

The Boston Patent Law Association, established in 1924, is one of the oldest associations of intellectual property lawyers and professionals in the U.S. The BPLA’s Invented Here! award highlights inventions made by New England inventors or New England companies.