, showing three innovative platforms focused on meeting transportation demands in growing cities.){kind=link}
Hyundai Motor Company demonstrated its future mobility vision at the recent CES 2020 exhibition (Jan. 7 – 10), showing three innovative platforms focused on meeting transportation demands in growing cities.
The driving force behind the interactive and virtual reality displays was Hyundai’s mission to achieve ‘progress for humanity’ by tackling real-world mobility challenges. At the Las Vegas exhibition, Hyundai’s S-A1, the company’s first fully-electric Personal Air Vehicle (PAV) concept for Urban Air Mobility (UAM*) took center stage, highlighting the potential of air travel to relieve crowded ground transportation infrastructure.
Hyundai also revealed its Purpose Built Vehicle (PBV) concept, capable of adapting to specific lifestyle needs of passengers and reducing time wasted on congested highways.
Following personalization, PBVs can perform any number of social functions, being a restaurant, coffee shop, hotel, or even a clinic and pharmacy, in addition to conducting an urban shuttle service.
Both of Hyundai’s new concept vehicles interact with the brand’s new docking stations, called Hubs.
Hyundai Motor’s CES exhibit explored the shifting definition of transportation, and the role Hyundai can play in fostering greater human-to-human interaction.
Urban Air Mobility and a new partnership with Uber Elevate
Public and media reaction to Hyundai’s concepts for Urban Air Mobility (UAM) and ways to connect communities was extremely positive. More than 150,000 people visited Hyundai’s CES exhibition booth to witness the company’s future mobility vision and display pieces, which includes PAV.
Response to the PAV, a fully-electric model capable of transporting four passengers and a pilot up to 100km on a single charge, indicates a real openness to progressive thinking. Visitors to the booth noted Hyundai’s four principles of UAM: safe, quiet, affordable and passenger-centered.
The CES show also played host to the signing of a partnership between Hyundai Motor and Uber Elevate. As a part of the agreement, Hyundai will develop a PAV model that harnesses its expertise in manufacturing, and Uber will utilize the vehicle to provide Urban Air Mobility service to customers.
To produce such vehicles in volume requires the expertise and production capability of a global manufacturer like Hyundai. Hyundai’s knowledge of aerodynamic design, the use of lightweight materials, sophisticated manufacturing, and how to reduce operating costs is crucial to bring this type of transportation to the masses in an economically viable way.
Purpose Built Vehicle concept and the Hub
Ushering in the era of seamless mobility, Hyundai’s booth also enabled visitors to explore how future urban transportation incorporates the electric PAV concept with a new ground transportation solution: the Purpose Built Vehicle (PBV) concept.
The design of the PBV concept was inspired by urban scenery, making passengers feel connected to the city even when moving through it. Inside and out, this vehicle can be transformed to meet the needs of passengers. The under-body can expand from four to six meters, while the upper-body can be made to order and customized using modular parts. Possible future applications include home delivery, a mobile restaurant, or even a medical clinic.
Hyundai’s vision for creating communities from future transit systems was completed by another new concept, called the Hub. When multiple PBVs and PAVs are docked and connected to a Hub, they make a new public space where diverse groups of people can come together.