CES 2020: Audi wants to make the car the "third living space"

Audi is bringing the AI:ME to CES once again, this time with VR glasses for testing. They allow passengers to virtually fly through a mountain landscape. The technology adjusts the virtual content in real-time to match the car's movements. This way, passengers are supposed to arrive at their destination relaxed, where food ordered in advance via the AI:ME has already been delivered. Journalists were able to test this concept live during an automated drive at CES 2020.

Audi also wants to get closer to users with the “empathetic” car, which operates similarly to the “AI:ME”: It knows its user and their habits – and aims to increase safety, wellbeing, and comfort through the use of artificial intelligence. After a short period, the empathetic Audi is supposed to know all preferred settings and adjust them automatically. If desired, it even aligns itself with the user's condition by observing driving style and vital functions. Audi combines all this in the “Audi Intelligence Experience” in a prototype.

More realistic, however, is the 3-D mixed-reality head-up display, which is set to enter series production in 2020. The technology was developed in collaboration with Samsung. The technology behind it: like a 3-D television, each image is produced with two views: one pixel for the left eye and the adjacent one for the right eye. For the driver, the images from the head-up display appear to float eight to ten meters ahead, indicating the road to take. Clever rendering can even stretch this apparent distance to over 70 meters, making it especially useful for navigation. Another advantage: the driver's eyes, which are generally focused on long-distance views in a car, do not need to adjust. This matches the “display-on-demand-transparent”: The screen is 15 centimeters high, 1.22 meters wide, and partially embedded in the dashboard. It offers two layers – a transparent OLED display and a Black-Layer for deep blacks. Sections of the display not needed for information remain transparent, giving the impression of a glass pane and a clear view of the road.

 

Last but not least, Audi presents the "Human Centric Lighting" project: This uses purposefully changing interior light colors to influence the well-being of passengers. This way, they also aim to increase the concentration and memory capabilities of the passengers.

What does that mean?

At CES, Audi is baking relatively small but very realistic rolls: All technologies could soon go into series production, which could significantly improve navigation in particular.