Understanding the fine art of calculating risk and mobility on the roadways

The value of understanding how people drive, the factors that affect how people drive, and the context of a multitude of driving situations can’t be understated. This area of data science might seem mundane — even opaque to the average viewer – but for companies that work in mobility and insurance, it’s a golden opportunity.

Enter Motion-S, a mobility data and analytics company that provides advanced services on risk assessment and profiling to their clients. In their determination to shape the future of mobility, they've embarked on a unique challenge to objectively asses individual driving behavior using heterogeneous data. Translation: how can they predict driver behavior (and potential outcomes) using a mountain of individual waypoints and no personally identifiable information?

First, Motion-S needed a mapping partner capable of providing highly-reliable maps with worldwide coverage. In order to build effective, objective situation models, map data was required to include layers that identify road layout, traffic signals, speed limits, road surface types and more. Additionally, all of those layers and data points needed to be available in a platform that was easily integrated into the Motion-S in-house systems. After several months of tests and trials, Motion-S selected HERE to seamlessly provide the essential location data.

Using data sets to create a reliable picture

By integrating the HERE Platform Data Extension into their process, Motion-S matched their raw GPS location data with real-world maps and road features such as weather, road conditions and traffic. What was previously a set of GPS coordinates was transformed into a rich profile of a complete journey. Each profile was added to an effective case study in driver behaviors, as well as changes in those behaviors based on weather conditions, heavy traffic, intersections, etc.

This approach proved successful not only with the trial data Motion-S used while evaluating HERE, but also succeeded in creating profiles from the historical data Motion-S gathered from previous traffic studies.

Insurance providers and companies in the mobility sector are in the business of understanding risk, which is not a simple calculation. Factoring variables – namely geospatial, temporal and behavioral – that lead up to traffic accidents can extend well beyond drivers’ control, as they all play their individual parts when an incident occurs (or is avoided).

The Motion-S Profiler platform acts as an engine for processing driving data, augmenting that information with location and environmental context, and rendering a score for the associated risk. This wouldn’t be possible without the precise map data provided by HERE’s strategic distribution partner, Local Eyes B.V. Equipped with the completeness of that data, Motion-S is able to offer objective, reliable risk scores to their customers.

Find out more about this case study, Motion-S, and our partner Local Eyes by reading more information here.