Ford Cedes Heart-Attack-Sensing Seat Development

Ford Motor Co. is abandoning work on an in-car system that would measure driver stress because it believes wearable health monitors can do the job cheaper and more accurately, the Financial Times reports.

Ford began three years ago to study how best to alert drivers to safety hazards without distracting or overloading them. The company envisioned a situational controller that might, for example, block incoming phone calls if it perceived the driver was busy coping with heavy city traffic.

To help analyze the stresses of driving, Ford developed a biometric seat, steering wheel and seatbelt combination that could measure a driver's heartbeat, breathing rate and temperature shifts.

In one scenario, the system could be used to detect a possible heart attack. Ford envisioned the technology being used to activate a self-driving feature that would safely steer a vehicle to the side of the road park it.

But the FT says Ford has decided recent advances in sensors, especially those appearing in wearable health monitors, offer more precise measurements.