#Infiniti Q Inspiration #Concept Previews Design Language [Auto Styling News]

Previewing a new generation of Infiniti vehicles, the Q Inspiration Concept proposes how an innovative VC-Turbo powertrain, next-level autonomous drive technologies, and a unique human-centric interior could enrich the experience of drivers in the mid-size sedan segment.

While this vehicle, per se, won't be hitting the road in the 2020s, Infiniti says this represents the next step in Infiniti design.

The exterior of the Q Inspiration Concept features clear and concise lines with dynamic and confident proportions. It is the first manifestation of Infiniti's new form language for an era of advanced powertrains. The concept sheds classical sedan forms with its coupe-like appearance and elongated silhouette, presenting Infiniti's design vision for vehicles in this segment.

#VW's ID CROZZ #Concept Is An Autonomous Electric Slated For 2026 [Auto Styling News]

Volkswagen's I.D. CROZZ concept offers a fashionable sneak peek of the future, and that future is electric, autonomously driven crossover. And it may be in driveways by early 2026.

The concept's sleek, four-door coupe shape has a similar footprint to the new 2018 Tiguan, with dramatic doors that open 90 degrees in the front and slide back in the rear to reveal a cavernous interior. On the outside, the I.D. CROZZ greets passengers with a light show, with lighted VW logos and daytime running lights that “awaken” like eyes.

Personally, I'm not even a fan of the many, many vehicles already on the road that "blink" by turning out the headlamp when the turn signal is engaged. But I'm sure this silliness will either be long gone by 2026, or will be so ubiquitous that we don't even notice anymore.

The exterior is quite handsome, and is a bit of a step up from today's rather bland VWs. The sliding rear doors are just plain silly, and likely won't make it to production, but are less silly than ones seen on many other concepts, or current minivans. Not sure they want to emulate minivans, but it's entirely possible they show up on the final version.

The I.D. CROZZ resembles, especially from a side view, the Toyota Prius Prime, which isn't a bad vehicle design to emulate.

The production car, says VW, will feature the company's I.D. Pilot self-driving system concept. That means that in self-driving mode, the steering wheel of the I.D. CROZZ will (rather horrifyingly) retract into the dash, and the interior lights will change color. Drivers can summon the I.D. Pilot by simple voice controls, and the concept system is designed to rely on four laser scanners that pop up from the roof of the I.D. CROZZ, as well as ultrasonic sensors, radar sensors, side area view cameras and a front camera.

VW estimates that the car's battery pack will be able to be recharged up to 80 percent in 30 minutes when using a 150-kWh fast charger. The company's EV plans are among the most ambitious in the industry, and call for launching next-generation electric vehicles on three continents - Europe, Asia and North America - anticipated to begin in 2020.

#Honda's Self-Driving NeuV #Concept Reads Emotions, Drives Strangers To Work [Auto Styling News]

Honda has unveiled the self-driving electric NeuV concept at the 2017 Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas that's part AI, part robotics, and part Uber.

The NeuV concept (pronounced "new-v" and stands for New Electric Urban Vehicle) was designed around the fact that privately-owned vehicles sit idle 96 percent of the time, while the owner sleeps, works or is otherwise away from the car. The NeuV seeks to create new value for its owner by functioning as an automated ride-sharing vehicle, picking up and dropping off customers at local destinations when the owner isn't using the car.

Yes, you read that correctly. Your car will drive around and pick up strangers while you're at work. Amazing. And kinda scary. But if this self-aware UberBot can make money on the side (and shares it with us!) then who are we not to embrace this change.

The NeuV also can sell energy back to the electric grid during times of high demand when it's not in use. These actions alone have the potential to create a new business model for enterprising customers who want to "monetize" their cars, says Honda.

The two-seater also functions as helpful Artificial Intelligence assistant, using an "emotion engine", an emerging technology developed by Honda and SoftBank.

Called HANA (Honda Automated Network Assistant), in its application in the NeuV, the "emotion engine" will learn from the driver by detecting the emotions behind the driver's judgments and then, based on the driver's past decisions, make new choices and recommendations. HANA can check on the driver's emotional well-being, make music recommendations based on mood, and support the owner's daily driving routine.

One pictures HANA saying, "You look really agitated by this heavy traffic, Dave. Can I take over the wheel for a bit?"

The NeuV features a full touch panel interface enabling both the driver and passenger to access a simple and convenient user experience.

So, how does the NeuV look?

In shape, one could make comparisons to any number of city car concepts, most recently the Swiss Rinspeed Oasis (debuting at the same show) and the Russian "Mirrow Provocator." Basically, both are really, really square. The boxy Scion IQ also comes to mind, from the front, anyway, as does the VW "BUDD-e" electric van concept, in style as well as in its pretensions to tech supremacy.

The two-seater has a good-sized storage area in back, and an electric skateboard for "last mile" transit, which in the concept, hangs in the back window like a shotgun in a country boy's pickup truck.

Outstanding outward visibility is achieved by a headerless windshield and a dramatically sloping belt line that is said to make maneuvering easy. (I say "said to" because this is so obviously a one-off that wont' see production in this decade that's all speculation how it drives.

The rear features tail lams that are, um, dramatic (to say the least.) They make anything Volvo has ever done seem TAME by comparison. Arching over both the sides and top of the rear "lip" these LED lights are sure to make it abundantly clear that its coming to a halt. Heck, it will be clear to the entire city it's driving in!

It's obvious to everyone that Syd Mead - the Visual Futurist for the 1982 film classic "Blade Runner," was prescient about the direction of vehicles by the end of the Twenty-Teens. Like, Nostradamus prescient!

#BMW Collab. Promises Driverless Cars By 2021 [Auto Styling News]

BMW, Intel, and Mobileye are teaming up to make self-driving autonomous vehicles a reality by 2021. The collaboration could be a very positive sign that even driverless cars could be headed to our driveways within a decade.

Announced at a July 1 press conference in Munich, Germany, leaders from the three companies - leaders in the automotive, technology and computer vision and machine learning industries - announced their collaboration.

BMW believes the path to get to a fully autonomous world is complex and will require end-to-end solutions that integrate intelligence across the network, from door locks to the data center. Transportation providers of the future, they said, must harness rapidly evolving technologies, collaborate with totally new partners, and prepare for disruptive opportunities.

The BMW iNEXT model will be the foundation for BMW Group’s autonomous driving strategy and set the basis for fleets of fully autonomous vehicles.

The goal of the collaboration is to develop future-proofed solutions that enable the drivers to not only take their hands off the steering wheel, but reach the so called “eyes off” (level 3) and ultimately the "mind off" (level 4) level transforming the driver’s in-car time into leisure or work time. This level of autonomy would enable the vehicle, on a technical level, to achieve the final stage of traveling "driver off" (level 5) without a human driver inside.

BMW believes this technology lays the foundation for entirely new business models in a connected, mobile world. If it comes about, this could clearly revolutionize the way we view vehicles, and could disrupt driving as much as Uber and Lyft have disrupted the taxi industry, or cellular disrupted the old "tethered" telephones our parents grew up with in the 20th Century.

Dangers for the project are not more clearly highlighted by the first fatal accident involving a self-driving Tesla S in May, which raised serious questions about the viability of the autopilot technology at this stage. Mobileye supplied some of the tech behind Tesla's automated driving car. It was founded in 1999 and was a pioneer in developing advanced collision avoidance systems.

BMW is wise to reach out to tech leaders to collaborate in this way. Hopefully the technology really will be ready to deliver what's being advertised by 2021.

Chinese LeSEE #Concept Car Hopes To Take On #Tesla [Auto Styling News]

Chinese entertainment and consumer technology company LeEco has unveiled its own self-driven electric car.

The futuristic-looking sedan called LeSEE was unveiled at a launch event in Beijing staged by LeEco. The current prototype model has a theoretical top speed of 130 miles an hour, said Ding Lei, head of LeEco’s automobile division, called the Super Electric Ecosystem unit.

The exterior design of the vehicle is indeed impressive. While somewhat Tesla-like it its rear haunches, nothing else resembles it, or in fact, anything, currently on the road. the large LED bar on the front apparently has functional headlights in there (or around it) somewhere, and the overall appearance is muscular and curvaceous.

In what Ding calls the "most beautiful" angle - from above and rear, shown below - one can see the full-glass roof which reaches from the hood to the trunk area. 

The launch featured a colorful mix of tech and entertainment, starting off with a performance by a popular Chinese singer and a demonstration of the tech company's virtual  reality headset device. Ding then delighted the crowd by using his cell phone to order the prototype to move on stage and park itself.

LeSEE was developed in 28 months, during which LeEco forged partnerships internationally to speed up the process.

Without providing technical specifications, Ding said the car will surpass the Model S from leading electric car maker Tesla in "all aspects of performance." That, of course, remains to be seen. But clearly this will, if it is built, be a challenger in the massive Chinese market.

#Mercedes Teases "Luxury In Motion" Autonomous Driving Concept

Mercedes Benz has released it's "Luxury In Motion" autonomous driving concept car and it truly looks like it would be a spectacular vehicle.

Mercedes says:

"The Mercedes-Benz F 015 Luxury in Motion research vehicle makes the future tangible with the revolutionary concept of autonomous driving. A luxury sedan with total connectivity between vehicle, passengers, and the outside world, it's a preview of how the self-driving car of the future could evolve into a platform for communication and interaction."

The shape is predictably futuristic, bringing to mind the 2056-era vehicles of "Minority Report." Clearly, with autonomous driving, the interior is expanded, and the windshield is positively rakish, almost 40 degrees, since the idea is to make the most of the interior space.

A video of the vehicle - which no one is under any illusion will be coming to a showroom anytime soon, or in this configuration - portrays autonomous driving as a peaceful and serene event, with video screens embedded in the doors, and an automatic table expanding from between the seats with the slightest touch of a hand.

Of course it seems to take a minute and a half to expand upwards, reminding one of the futuristic-looking "electronic curtains" that closed in a mere seven minutes with the touch of a remote, portrayed in 1950s films showing how wonderful the future would be.

The four occupants (including, apparently, the "driver") are shown casually speaking with one another as the front row is turned backwards to face the rear occupants. This would seem to be the dawn of a new age of personal interaction in vehicles, until one realizes that the car would definitely be Wi-Fi enabled (since Chevy Impalas in 2015 already are) and the four would be heads-down in their smartphones, or Google Goggles, or whatever is big in 2025.

This kind of fanciful vision is par for the course for such speculative concepts, and we have to bear with them. Still, if the Mercedes of 2025 looks anything like this, we're in for some beautiful vehicles. Not that all but a few would be able to afford such a beast.