Author | Yuanyi
Source| Jiguo Editorial Department
In today's new energy vehicle field, the most important thing is the tide of latecomers, both Xiaomi smashed 10 billion and firmly wanted to build cars from scratch, and there were also like Sony, who unexpectedly announced new cars directly. #汽车科技要闻 #
At CES 2022, Sony brought a new all-electric SUV, the VISION-S 02 concept car, and announced that it will officially establish Sony's automotive division in the spring of 2022.
"This spring, we will set up a new company, Sony Mobility, to accelerate the layout of the automotive sector," said Kenichiro Yoshida, SONY CEO. "We are working to explore the commercial launch of Sony's electric vehicles."
Recently, Sony also exposed a video of 5G remote driving technology, allowing drivers to drive the VISION-S test vehicle located in Germany in Japan, which is the same as the principle of 5G remote surgery in the medical field and is very groundbreaking.
At the same time, Sony officially announced more details of the new car, so that we can understand its core technology of car manufacturing.
From the appearance point of view, VISION-S 02 did not subvert the VISION-S 01 released in 2020, the design style of the two cars is simply the same, only this time from a sedan to an SUV model, and it is a medium and large 7-seat pure electric SUV.
The interior features a triple-screen design that runs through the entire center console, with a knob-type electronic shift mechanism and a touch-sensitive functional control area under the center console.
The panel skin displayed on the panoramic screen can be customized, including the dashboard of the driver's seat. Sony has prepared various themes based on movies and seasons, and users can create their own driving space according to their preferences.
The co-pilot position LCD screen can directly run the PS5 game, it seems that the computing power of this chip is not bad. But now Tesla will be able to play "The Witcher 3", and Sony's PS5 in the car is not new.
Although the interior of VISION-S 02 is full of science and technology, there are many similar designs in domestic new energy vehicles, and we have long been surprised.
To the video and audio function of this piece is Sony's strength, the official said that with the current assisted driving more and more mature, they hope that vision-S series models are not only a simple travel tool, but also should be built into a comfortable and comfortable movable living room.
To this end, Sony is equipped with the 360 REALITY AUDIO immersive panoramic audio system, whose original 3D sound effect technology creates a separate sound stage for each passenger seat, so that every passenger can get the best sound texture.
In addition, the front and rear of the VISION-S 02 concept car provide large-size entertainment screens, which can be controlled through gestures, touch, voice interaction and PlayStation controllers, combined with 3D sound technology to achieve an immersive viewing and entertainment experience in the car.
Incidentally, as a new car-making force, Sony not only has a wealth of interactive systems, but also demonstrates its hard power in the digital industry through VISION-S 02.
For vision-S 02, Sony focused on showcasing its achievements in human-computer interaction systems and autonomous driving.
The SUV will uphold safety as the first priority, combined with the vehicle's audio system and human-machine interface system, can provide the most intuitive driver interaction, so that the driver can accurately judge the state of the surrounding environment from the car, such as whether there is an emergency vehicle.
Once the VISION-S 02 is connected to the network, it can be set up with a special APP program to control whether the vehicle is ready to go. The vehicle starts, adjusts the room temperature and seat position, and automatically unlocks the door as the driver approaches, making it easy to get started as soon as the driver enters.
Aspects of human-computer interaction in the car include facial, speech and gesture recognition. It reads the driver's facial expressions and gestures to determine whether he is focused and tired driving, and alerts as needed.
Using a ToF camera sensor, the system can read the movement of the driver's lips and recognize the words. For example, even in noisy environments such as playing music or passing through noisy construction sites, commands can be executed by the driver's voice with high precision.
In terms of automatic driving, Sony has adopted a camera-based design scheme, and said at the press conference that the solution of integrating image sensors and radar sensors has landed.
Sony said that the VISION-S 02 has a total of 40 sensors installed inside and outside the car, 360 degrees around the body, always pay attention to driving safety.
These sensors use state-of-the-art optical sensors, ranging sensors, millimeter-wave radar, as well as high-sensitivity, high-resolution, wide dynamic range CMOS image sensors and LiDAR sensors that accurately perceive three-dimensional space.
For example, the system continuously monitors the surrounding environment and advises the driver to change lanes easily when it is safe to change lanes. The driver can automatically change lanes simply by operating the turn signal.
When driving, in addition to maintaining a safe vehicle spacing, the system can also automatically track the vehicle in front, detect whether the target lane is still under construction, and select the lane where the vehicle can travel.
It is worth mentioning that in order to achieve the commercial process of electric vehicles, Sony has also attracted NVIDIA, Qualcomm, Bosch, ZF, Bosch, BlackBerry, QNX, Horse brand and other manufacturers to jointly create the VISION-S series.
As early as the VISION-S concept car, Sony began a remote control driving experiment based on 5G, and the technology was still not absent in the VISION-S 02 concept car.
Japan is about 9,400 kilometers away from Germany, and Sony's engineers in Tokyo successfully remotely control test vehicles as far away as Germany via a 5G network connection.
Drivers can drive German cars remotely via real-time video from an office monitor through the steering wheel, throttle and brake simulators.
It can be seen that the VISION-S reached a speed of 61 km / h in the test, and demonstrated a series of operations such as turning, accelerating, decelerating and braking, and in order to ensure safety, there are also drivers in the car ready at any time.
The whole operation process is like playing a game in an external simulator at home, which may provide a new direction for future travel methods, and also prepare for driving in the future "metaverse" world?
Of course, this function is difficult to officially put into practice in the environment where 5G has not yet been fully rolled out, after all, every millisecond delay involves the safety of vehicles and pedestrians.
But at least this also makes an example for remote OTA upgrades, the current increasingly mature car networking technology, so that the car has become a "big mobile phone", I believe that in the future after the 5G network landing, OTA upgrade methods will become more diversified.
Finally, Sony did not disclose whether the Vision-S 02 is the first commercial product, and the specific mass production matters are not yet eyebrows.
However, from the objective facts, compared with the early "PPT car" companies, Sony is still prepared to enter the automotive field this time, coupled with deep technical accumulation, as well as its own clear market positioning, the future in the new energy travel may really be able to occupy a place. As for whether it can finally be recognized by the market, only time can give the answer.