Methods and apparatus for home-to-vehicle applications over wireless links

A dongle for enabling communication between a vehicle and an information handling device, the dongle comprising:

• an external coupling device for coupling to the information handling device;
• dongle transceiver circuitry for remote keyless entry communication with the vehicle;
• and
• a dongle controller coupled to the external coupling device for determining when the dongle is coupled to the information handling device, wherein the dongle controller is further coupled to the dongle transceiver circuitry for providing a remote keyless entry wakeup message to the dongle transceiver circuitry in response to receiving a communication initiation signal from the information handling device.

A communication system in a vehicle for communicating with an information handling device at a wireless access point, the system comprising:

• first wireless transceiver circuitry for communicating with the information handling device via a predetermined local area wireless link;
• second wireless transceiver circuitry for communicating with a dongle via a remote keyless entry communication link;
• and
• a communication controller coupled to the first and second wireless transceiver circuitries and for activating the first wireless transceiver circuitry for communicating via the predetermined local area wireless link with the information handling device at the wireless access point in response to detecting reception of a remote keyless entry wakeup message received by the second wireless transceiver circuitry.