Its official, women are hopeless at driving. I know this will anger all those feminists out there, but unfortunately a survey of 4,200 drivers (men and women!) by insurance company elephant.co.uk has proved it. The survey found that female motorists are much more likely to suffer parking stress than men, particularly when someone else is watching them.

I’m afraid I have to agree with this survey. I am hideous at parking – I hardly ever reverse into a space, and if my boyfriend is in the car with me, I usually get him to park the car if it’s a particularly tight spot. And apparently I’m not alone, the survey found that women are twice as likely to ask someone else to park their car for them, and three-quarters admit that backing into a space is at times too tricky even when there is sufficient room. This compares to just 9% of men who admit they are useless at parallel parking and half who admit that reverse parking can be tricky.

Interestingly, earlier this year, the AA revealed that 34 per cent of drivers would fail on parallel parking if forced to retake their driving test.

Fortunately, many car makers, including Ford, Volkswagen and Mercedes, have wizened on to the fact that us girlies are useless at parking and have invented parking assist gadgets to help us out. Ford’s Parking Assist, for example, uses four ultrasonic sensors located in the rear bumper which are activated when the ignition is switched on and the reverse gear is selected. As the car is reversed the sensors detecte any obstacles behind the car and will alert a warning sound when the car gets too close. So if you own a Ford and you find yourself panicking at the thought of having to park your car, pop down to your local Ford dealer to find out more, and let those panic-stricken moments be a thing of the past and let’s beat those boys at parking!

Future IT services might drive developments able to save today’s car-makers. For new technology to become reality, a much greater openness within the vehicle sector and a radical shift in the way vehicles are viewed is strongly needed.

” The vehicle industry currently views IT services as something that primarily concern the physical vehicle. However, a broader perspective provides the realization that a vehicle is so much more, it is a workplace, a cog in a complex transport flow, a financial asset – but also a cause of accidents and environmental impact,” says Jonas Kuschel, a researcher in applied information technology at the University of Gothenburg.

In his thesis, Vehicle Services, Jonas Kuschel studies the prerequisites for the development of future IT services for vehicles, so-called vehicle services. For example, IT solutions within the vehicle sector might make it possible for a vehicle to automatically book a time for service and repair via a wireless connection, but it might also entail supplying services to town planners to enable understanding of traffic patterns or current emissions levels. The list of potential services can easily be extended.

However, if the perspective is limited to focus on the physical vehicle, there is a risk that the vehicle industry misses out on a lot of new innovations. According to Kuschel, the capacity to develop new inventions and applications requires the vehicle industry to open up its innovation work and allow other actors to enter into the field of developing services.

“It requires the vehicle industry to move from perceiving vehicle services as a part of the product and instead to focus on the services as a part of vehicle usage within a network of actors. It is more important to focus on how a vehicle is used and which role it plays in society and people’s lives than on product development,” says Jonas Kuschel.