Kia wants to bring a fully autonomous car to market by 2030, while developing semi-autonomous 'stepping stone' technology for its road vehicles by 2020. Thus, it has launched a new sub-brand at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas, which the Korean firm is calling 'Drive Wise'.
What does Drive Wise cover?
On show at CES were Highway Autonomous Driving (HAD), Urban Autonomous Driving (UAD), Preceding Vehicle Following (PVF), Emergency Stop System (ESS) with Driver Status Monitoring (DSM), Traffic Jam Assist (TJA) and Autonomous Valet Parking (presumably, because of fear of litigation from the Alien Versus Predator mob, Kia deigns not to refer to this as AVP). Most of these are self-explanatory, partially automated ways of making the car drive or move largely on its own, with little or no human interaction - but ESS is interesting, as it monitors the driver's face and, if they spend too much time with their eyes off the road (intentionally or not), the car pulls safely into a side road and comes to a halt.
Has Kia got anything else up its sleeve?
Yes, it's working on a new Human Machine Interface (HMI) incorporating gesture control, fingerprint sensors and smart-device connectivity. Reverting to Drive Wise for a moment, all of Kia's grand plans for 2030 do of course rely on the full implementation of vehicle-to-everything (V2X) communications.
So how is Kia showing off Drive Wise in a way people who aren't at CES can understand?
In this rather snazzy short video. Remember the 1989 Batman film, with Michael Keaton and Jack Nicholson? Where the Caped Crusader could talk to his Batmobile and get it to drive to him when he needed it? Well, here's a Kia Soul doing much the same thing for a girl shopping in a market, and also a Sorento dutifully moving to the bottom of a mountain for its paragliding owner.
