With the acquisition of Canesta, Microsoft is now the holder of smart airbag and pothole avoidance technologies patents, putting them squarely in the automotive industry. So what are they going to do with these patents? Watch & see.
Kinect is Microsoft’s revolutionary new game console accessory that eliminates the need for a controller. This little black box (with the use of 2 simple wristbands) turns your body into the controller, so playing games becomes ultra-realistic. 
If you jump, your Avatar jumps. If you kick, your Avatar kicks. If you turn your invisible car wheel and slam on the make-believe brakes, your "joy ride" will respond accordingly. Kinect senses, interprets, and responds to your natural movements and hand gestures with its camera. With a simple hand wave, it will recognize the next person and then pull up their Avatar for multi-player fun.
So what does this have to do with airbag technology and your car? This same technology is what is used in the newly emerging collision avoidance and pothole avoidance systems. 
Using infrared cameras (sensors), these systems bounce light off an object and return it (like radar guns work) giving the computer in your car an image map of the surrounding environment. With this information, vehicles are now able to interpret the road conditions and/or a potential accident and respond accordingly.
With a simple game and the technology available at Microsoft, over 39 million Xbox users will be helping to advance this technology in the safety of their living rooms. Once these ‘test game’ systems have advanced, who’s to say that Microsoft will not be in the forefront of implementing this technology on the car in your garage?