Geneva IMS Connected Car Concepts & Tires

Connected car and tire concepts at the Geneva Motor Show show some future ideas for self-driving cars, flying cars and intelligent tires. Volkswagen’s robo-taxi Sedric is a living room on wheels. The Pop.Up is a ground and air concept vehicle. The Mercedes-AMG GT Concept is a four-door luxury sports concept. Goodyear Tire & Rubber Company showed some new concept tires with AI and sensors.

Volkswagen’s Robo-Taxi Sedric

VW showed Sedric a self-driving mobile living room SUV or robo-taxi a level 5 autonomous car. Sedric is the pioneer, and it is the “Father” of numerous concepts for a new form of individual mobility. Soon Sedric will also get “children” and “grandchildren” with VW Group’s various brands. They will be created in typical designs for the brands and will feature tailor-made and customer-specific characteristics for equipment.

Just press the button – and Sedric comes along, precisely at the time indicated in advance. Sedric recognizes its user and the two-part door opens. The opening is wide and high, making it easy for passengers to get in even with luggage. There is plenty of room for bags and suitcases in the generously proportioned interior.

When a passenger gets into the car, they can talk to Sedric. Passengers can talk to Sedric about the destination, how to get there, the driving time, the current traffic situation, perhaps even a short break on the way – users can talk to Sedric like they would with a personal assistant. While you are on the road, you can choose exactly what you want to do. The windscreen is a big OLED screen with augmented reality serves as a communication and entertainment center – but passengers can also close their eyes, sit back and relax.

Flying and Land Rolling Car Pop.Up Ground & Air

During the Geneva International Motor Show, Italdesign and Airbus world-premiered Pop.Up, the first modular, fully electric, zero emission concept vehicle system designed to relieve traffic congestion in crowded megacities. Pop.Up envisages a modular system for multi-modal transportation that makes full use of both ground and airspace.With traffic congestion projected to hugely increase by 2030, the companies decided to combine their engineering expertise to tackle how to best achieve a sustainable, modular and multimodal urban mobility system – giving rise to the Pop.Up concept.

Pop.Up System consists of a three layers concept:

an Artificial Intelligence platform that, based on its user knowledge, manages the travel complexity offering alternative usage scenarios and assuring a seamless travel experience;
a vehicle shaped as a passenger capsule designed to be coupled with two different and independent electric propelled modules (the ground module and the air module). Other public means of transportation (e.g. trains or hyperloops) could also integrate the Pop.Up capsule;
an interface module that dialogues with users in a fully virtual environment.

The Pop.Up system aims to give time back to commuters through a flexible,. The Pop.Up vehicle combines the flexibility of a small two seater ground vehicle with the freedom and speed of a vertical take-off and landing (VTOL) air vehicle.

Passengers plan their journey and book their trip via an easy-to-use app. The system automatically suggests the best transport solution – according to user knowledge, timing, traffic congestion, costs, ridesharing demands – joining either the air or ground module or other means of transportation to the passenger capsule, and following passengers’ preferences and needs.

For megacity journeys with high congested traffic, the capsule disconnects from the ground module and is carried by a 5 by 4.4 metre air module propelled by eight counter-rotating rotors. In this configuration, Pop.Up becomes a urban self-piloted air vehicle, taking advantage of the third dimension to get from A to B efficiently whilst avoiding traffic congestion on the ground.
Once passengers reach their destination, the air and ground modules with the capsule autonomously return to dedicated recharge stations to wait for their next customers.

Because of the possibility of combining the capsule also with other means of public transportation, the Pop.Up offers a seamless travel experience.

Mercedes-AMG GT Concept Hybrid

As part of its 50th anniversary Mercedes-AMG is this year celebrating not only the successful past and present; above all it is looking forward with a concept car.

The Mercedes-AMG GT Concept is the third completely autonomously developed sports car with four door. The AMG GT Concept is combination of an ultramodern V8 gas engine and a high-performance electric motor. The new coupé thus blends the high functionality of the performance cars with the sportiness of the AMG GT sports cars. The show car gives a sneak preview of the exterior design of the coming series production model.

The energy storage unit is more powerful than conventional hybrid batteries, but at the same time more compact and lighter – further proof of the systematic way in which the AMG Lightweight Performance Strategy is being implemented. On a modular basis the system is scalable upwards, so that the performance and capacity of the battery can be adjusted to meet specific requirements of customers or certain markets.

The charging of the battery during the journey occurs on the one hand via brake recuperation, but on the other hand also with the aid of the combustion engine if the battery charge has dropped beneath a certain threshold value.

Three operating modes can be preselected via the electric drive unit: the AMG GT Concept either drives purely electrically or only with the combustion engine or it optimally combines both drive sources with one another as a hybrid

Intelligent AI Tires

The Goodyear Tire & Rubber Company showcased several new and emerging technologies in its latest concept tires imagined for the future of the automotive industry this week at the Geneva International Motor Show.

Its new concepts – the spherical-shaped Eagle 360 Urban and the IntelliGrip Urban smart tire – apply emerging technologies like artificial intelligence and vehicle-to-everything (V2X) connectivity to help the autonomous vehicles of the future navigate the millions of possible unknowns we face in every day driving scenarios.

Goodyear Eagle 360 Urban

The Eagle 360 Urban is an evolution of Goodyear’s 2016 spherical-shaped design concept for autonomous vehicles, further integrating the tire into the vehicle’s nervous system by giving the concept an artificial intelligence ‘brain’ that allows it to sense, decide, transform and interact. Key features include:

V2X communications connectivity to gather and share real-time information about driving conditions from the tires, other vehicles, infrastructure, and traffic systems for a complete picture;
Artificial intelligence to process the data through deep learning algorithms and improve braking, handling and efficiency; and,
A bionic skin made of a super-elastic polymer with high-sensory capacity and the flexibility to adapt its tread pattern to driving conditions with the help of actuators beneath the surface.

The IntelliGrip Urban is a smart tire concept designed for autonomous, on-demand transportation, with a focus on maximizing uptime and reducing operating costs for ride-sharing service providers. Key features include:

Sensor-in-tire technology to gather and share information about road and weather conditions with the vehicle control system to optimize speed, braking, handling and stability;
Proactive maintenance through telematics and tire health monitoring to maximize uptime by allowing fleet operators to precisely identify and resolve tire-related issues safely before they happen; and,
A fuel efficient tall and narrow design that reduces rolling resistance and extends range for electric vehicles, as well as fewer tread grooves to reduce noise levels and offer a more comfortable ride and longer tread life.

Although these tires are future concepts, they represent an essential aspect of Goodyear’s innovation strategy and customer focus in the new mobility ecosystem, said Zekoski.

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Volkswagen’s Robo-Taxi Sedric

Flying and Land Rolling Car Pop.Up Ground & Air

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