Sony to Enter Electric Vehicle Market

• Content
• Fleet & Transportation
• Sony to Enter Electric Vehicle Market

13 January 2022

The Sony Group Corporation has exhibited a new SUV-type prototype electric vehicle at CES 2022.

Sony will establish a brand new company, Sony Mobility Inc, in the spring of 2022 to “evolve the mobility experience” and “make the best use of AI and robotics technologies, help realise a world where everyone can live in harmony with robots on a daily basis, fill people with emotion, and contribute to society.”

VISION-S 02 Prototype Vehicle

The VISION-S 02 prototype vehicle analyses the surrounding environment in real-time, with sensors installed 360 degrees around the vehicle. These sensors include high-sensitivity, high-resolution, wide dynamic range CMOS image sensors and lidar sensors that accurately sense three-dimensional space.

Time-of-Flight (ToF) sensors are used to provide monitoring functions for driver authentication and to watch over passengers. They also support intuitive gesture and voice commands. Vehicle settings, key locks, and user settings can be synchronised by linking the vehicle to the cloud using 5G.

Anticipating the Autonomous Driving Era

Using their in-house communication technologies, Sony conducted driving experiments connecting Japan and Germany with 5G and is working with its partners to achieve low-latency transmission (video and control signals) and communication control (monitoring and prediction) using telematics systems.

These features are in anticipation of the arrival of the “autonomous driving era”.

In-Car Entertainment

Entertainment is also a focus for Sony – the seat speakers create a three-dimensional sound field, and "360 Reality Audio" provide an immersive music experience, intended to mimic being at a live music show. Passengers will also be able to play PlayStation® games through a remote connection to a console at home, in addition to the ability to play streaming games through the cloud.

Picture: a press photograph from the launch, showing two electric vehicle prototypes 

Article written by Ella Tansley | Published 13 January 2022

Share

Related Articles