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Hyundai sets up Project IONIQ Lab to help speed up innovations in future mobility

160721 Hyundai Motor Establishes Project IONIQ Lab 1

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26 July 2016

HYUNDAI, not content with launching its IONIQ hatchback range with choice of low emission technologies – hybrid, plug-in hybrid and EV – has now set up the Project IONIQ Lab in Korea.

Hyundai says Project IONIQ is a long-term research and development project that will predict changes in future mobility.

Project Ioniq

What is Project IONIQ Lab?

  • Project IONIQ Lab gathers top academics to forecast trends of future mobility
  • Lab identifies megatrends likely to impact the car industry in 2030
  • Through Project IONIQ Lab, Hyundai Motor works to enhance the lives of its customers

It’s an open innovation organisation, enabling cooperation among Hyundai, academic bodies and universities to suggest ideas for innovative technologies and future mobility concepts.

Hyundai executive VP Wonhong Cho, said: “We are happy to announce the opening of the ‘Project IONIQ Lab’, which extends our efforts to understand future mobility and influence the concept of ‘freedom in mobility’. Hyundai Motor will advance theoretical and practical understanding, innovating to develop future mobility solutions tailored to our customers’ lifestyles.”

The Lab will explore four key areas:

  • freedom to use mobility whenever and wherever;
  • freedom to connect to everyday life while on the move;
  • freedom from accidents and inconveniences; and
  • freedom from environmental pollution and energy exhaustion.

Project IONIQ Lab will be led by Dr Soon Jong Lee, Professor of Seoul National University and head of Korea’s Future Design & Research Institute, supported by 10 researchers and 10 consultant experts. The group has already issued its first collective output, a summary of 12 future ‘megatrends’ that are likely to affect the car industry in 2030.

Hyundai IONIQ ElectricRead our reviews of the Hyundai Ioniq car

From a ‘hyper-connected society’ and ‘eco-ism’ to the ‘decentralisation of power’ and ‘mega-urbanisation’ the megatrends set out the Project IONIQ Lab’s vision of the world, explaining how mobility will interact with each trend.

Hyundai says that through Project IONIQ Lab, Hyundai will be able to predict changes in future mobility and study possible scenarios; develop new types of mobility according to changes in society and people’s lifestyles; and create new service models and mobility experiences to extend the role and definition of ‘cars’.

Project IONIQ Lab’s 12 megatrends

Hyper-connected Society

Technological evolution in the fields of Cloud Computing and Big Data Analysis, together with Network technology for which IoT is one of the representing technologies, are forecasted to increase data transmission speed by an enormous ratio. This will result in a shift into a “Hyper-connected society”, a time when people get/are connected to things and the society on a real-time basis.
Mobility is expected to become a focal point in the “Hyper-connected society” with the influence of ICT innovation that is being actively applied to the automotive industry. Therefore, with entering the V2X generation/time, it is becoming more and more important to deeply examine/analyze what kinds of information and resources mobility will be exchanging with people and infra.

 

Hyper-ageing Society

In 2030, most of developed countries are expected to be hyper-aging society of which ratio of 65 years old or older is 21% or more due to low birth rate and a rapidly aging population. Under this circumstance, strategy to target the baby boom generation will be increasingly important as they will become majority of the market.

Accordingly, future mobility is expected to cope with primary value of the elderly such as health, healing, communication, etc. Especially new type of mobility such as wearable robot will be introduced in the market as elder people need to maintain their own activity while they will be regarded as a core target in providing in-car services or diverse auto-related services such as car-sharing, ride-hailing, etc.

 

Eco-ism

Needs for alternative energy is increasing due to worldwide and governmental initiative to sort out environmental issues such as global warming, climate change, fossil fuel depletion, etc.
Most countries will impose stricter environmental regulation and it will lead to more construction for infrastructure driven by government and technical progress in utilizing alternative energy, increasing energy efficiency, etc.

Following this trend, various mobility products that only consume eco-friendly energy or has low power or energy consumption will be in the market requiring sufficient infrastructure to support this. Manufactures or transportation providers are expected to deal with this by developing eco-technologies to meet the relevant regulations.

 

Multi-Layered Mash-up

Compared to conventional industrial convergence, ‘Multi-Layered Mash-up’ leads to merge of value chains from several different industries. And then each unit of value chain of any industry will be improved further by taking advantage of several areas such as technology, culture, science, art and etc. It becomes increasingly possible due to advances in MR (mixed reality) and ICT technology which lessens limitation in time and space and tackles barriers among industries.
In auto industry, mobility’s role as a space is going to expand offering seamless user experience as mobility will be less limited. In addition, it will be possible to search new business opportunities by collaborating with various industries and areas.

 

Context-Awareness based Individualisation

Context cognition technology is able to provide customised information making use of biological and emotional signal of users and the meaning of spaces to users without users’ being aware of the processing. It is far beyond the current stage which depends on the information that users input and will be able to design and propose personal life-style of the future.

With this progressive contextual curation based on AI technology, hyper-individualised mobility which offers various in-car services that reacts to personal condition and emotional states in real-time by will be in the market.

 

High Concept Society

High concepts relates to identifying patterns and opportunities, appreciating artistic and emotional beauty, and combining what appears to be unrelated ideas into strong innovative actionable ideas. As manufacturing capability is standardis ded due to disruptive manufacturing revolution such as open source, 3D printing technology, cloud sourcing and etc., creativity by converging stories and ideas that are appealing in emotional ways will be crucial. And capabilities indigenous to humans which is not replaceable by AI will be spotlighted and further developed.

This trend will make companies fragile to produce creativity collapse as it lowers barriers of entry of conventional industries.

Consequently open-sourced mobility manufacturing system based on convergence between technology and art, aesthetics, etc will enable consumers to realize their own ideas and creativity leading private-manufacturing market to a rise.

 

Decentralisation of Power

The boundaries typically associated with global, local, mainstream, and alternative cultures are starting to blur as network technologies become more open and inclusive. This blurring also facilitates an emergent period for various minority groups, allowing their normally overshadowed concerns to come to the spotlight.

In addition, the Fourth Industrial Revolution, characterised by technological convergence and the coalescence of the physical and virtual realms, will only accelerate this trend of diversification. The rising of various minority groups will upset the global status quo perpetuated by various governments, corporations, and key technologies and result in an intensified and expedited competition for leadership. Once a leader emerges for each link in the new value chain, convergence and cooperation will be the core values that guide the following industrial age.

 

Anxiety and Chaos

Societal anxiety and chaos are being driven by unrelenting technological evolution, causing an increase in cyber terrorism/crime, class polarsation, techno-stress, and generational conflict. In addition, advancements in AI are threatening to markedly increase competition across the entirety of human society.

In light of these pressures, consumers will demand spaces and experiences that empathise and alleviate their anxieties. Mobility as a healing medium will become more important, no longer will it be simply a means of transport; its spacial value will drastically increase and as a result there must be in-depth research and analysis into utilising mobility interior spaces more effectively, according to user needs.

 

Sharing Society

Advances in networking technologies have reduced the cost of sharing, lowering the bar for a “sharing economy” and accelerating its adoption. This new sharing economy, valuing economic rationality rather than social status, has started to enter the mainstream; goods are valued on their stories, experiences, and other intangible values in this new shared society.
Therefore, it is predicted that future mobility, based on efficiency and economic viability, will appeal to this new shared economy by developing and implementing on-demand services or platforms that maximise the user’s mobility experiences. A mutually beneficial sharing foundation that is capable of advancing common interest must be laid

 

Co-Evolution

As AI and robotics developments begin to supplant human labour and develop emotive capabilities, humans will be able to exchange thoughts and emotions with AI too, resulting in convergence. While future robots may increase convenience for human beings, it may offset that by tipping cost efficiency against human labour on an unprecedented scale. Therefore, if humans are to find value in this new labour hierarchy, there must be interaction and mutual cooperation with AI to bring about further development.

In terms of mobility, AI will mean perfect understanding between vehicle and machine, resulting in services that result in emotional bonding. Autonomous vehicle systems will also hard-override human errors in ability or judgement, and mobility as a whole will drastically reinvent its own value systems. In addition, it has become imperative to establish ethical rules for future mobility systems in order to assure safety, efficiency, and control.

 

Mega-Urbanisation

The UN predicts that by 2030, approximately 70% of the world population, 4.9 billion people, will be living in urban areas. It is expected that this rise of megacities will have major effects on urbanite mobility and housing patterns. Having tens of millions of people residing in increasingly denser areas raises issues concerning energy shortages, traffic congestion, pollution, further polarisation, as well as many other. It follows that people’s needs, preferences, and methods of transport will all change accordingly, drastically changing every aspect of public transportation, including hardware, software, and the services themselves.

 

Neo Frontierism

In order to alleviate problems that come with overcrowding, new concepts driven by the advancement of drone technology will open the skies to development. The final frontier of Earth, the oceans and subterranean areas will also see a renewed period of pioneering. While humans extend their influences in the air, underwater, space, and the Earth itself, various industries such as energy, construction, IT, and mobility will innovate heavily. The expansion of humanity’s physical domain presents a vast opportunity for the mobility industry to diversify and expand into.

 

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