The show is about wooing them back.
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Styling is only part of the package, however, with the IDS introduced as a preview not only of Nissan’s evolving design language, but also its electric powertrain and driverless vehicle technology. The biennial exhibition of vehicles in Japan runs for the public from Friday, October 30.
Nissan unveiled an autonomous electric vehicle, which it said would “revolutionise the relationship between auto and driver, and future mobility”. The Japanese automaker called it IDS, which stands for “intelligent driving system”. They also say the price of automotive batteries will have come down enough by then to make the cars affordable.
The first step in Nissan’s plan to launch an autonomous vehicle by 2020, the Leaf Piloted Drive 1.0 Concept comes with an array of sensors and cameras to enable lane changes, merges on and off highways, and passing of vehicles without driver assistance.
A major challenge for cars that drive themselves is winning social acceptance. When a pedestrian is near, the strip turns red to indicate the car’s awareness. That’s about as controlled an environment as you can have on the road given how slow cars are moving.
Combined with the weight advantage of a carbon-fibre body and a slew of aerodynamic fins and cuts, a production version of the IDS could offer range comparable to that of a conventional small petrol-powered hatch.
Driving operations can be handled through the Artificial Intelligence (AI), voice and gestures made by the driver.
The IDS can also recommend when you should stop to eat if it thinks you’re getting exhausted and, if you feed the system information about your eating habits, the vehicle can, “check you log of past meals to provide restaurant suggestions”, Ghosn said. When in autonomous drive mode, the head-up display is supplemented by a central cluster displaying a bird’s eye view of the vehicle and its surroundings, a feature which we’re sure a few will love and others will loathe.
Cars already can connect to the Internet. People who buy the S are more likely to be content with a basic people mover for getting back and forth to work and won’t need a lot of expensive options on their cars.
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Mitsubishi eX and Emirai – The Japanese brand is showing off two concepts at the show.
