Honda's ambitious wish list
Honda continues its inexorable march into a brave new future with a slew of corporate initiatives including, our favourite, a plan to go into the airborne mobility business!
While solidifying its existing businesses as the foundation of the company, and leveraging core competencies, Honda says it is "thoroughly committed to contributing to the realisation of a society with zero environmental impact and zero traffic collisions and also to new initiatives that enable Honda to take on challenges in new areas".
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| Keiji Ohtsu, President and Representative Director of Honda R&D Co., Ltd. |
"In addition to research on advanced environmental and safety technologies, Honda R&D Co., Ltd., which takes a lead role in Honda's technology research and development, is pursuing outside-the-box research on technologies that will bring about new value for people by expanding the potential of mobility into the 3rd dimension, then the 4th dimension - which defies the constraints of time and space, and ultimately into outer space.
"These new initiatives include an electric vertical take-off and landing aircraft (eVTOL), an avatar robot with the goal of expanding the range of human ability, and a new challenge in the field of outer space.
"Honda eVTOL aircraft: will make mobility in the skies more accessible for people and leverage our electrification technologies for its gas turbine hybrid power unit. Adoption of the hybrid power unit enables the extension of range, which will enable Honda eVTOL to provide inter-city (city-to-city) transportation, where the market size is expected to grow in the future.
"Honda will create a new 'mobility ecosystem' featuring Honda eVTOL at its core, connected with mobility products on the ground".
Second, "Honda will develop an avatar robot with the goal to expand the range of human ability virtually without the constraints of time and place/space. The Honda Avatar Robot will be equipped with a multi-fingered hand, an application of Honda robotics technologies, and Honda's original AI-supported remote control function. With a view to putting the Honda Avatar Robot into practical use in the 2030s, Honda is pursuing development with a goal to conduct technology demonstration testing before the end of the fiscal year ending March 31, 2024.
"Honda has been continuously working on robotics research, including the research and development of its bi-pedal robot ASIMO. As a part of next-generation Honda robotics, Honda is pursuing development for the practical applications of Honda's original avatar robot to expand the range of human ability - an avatar robot can act as a second self of the user, that the user can perform tasks and experience things without being there in person, including the realistic sense of handling objects remotely."
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| The Honda eVTOL concept for a new city-to-city mobility ecosystem. |
Third, Honda says it will "take on the challenges in the field of space technology, including building a circulative renewable energy system on the lunar surface by leveraging Honda fuel cell technologies and high differential pressure water electrolysis technologies, applying Honda's multi-fingered robotic hand, AI-supported remote control function, and highly-responsive torque control technologies to remotely-controlled robots which will perform tasks on the lunar surface.
"The proposal by young Honda engineers is to research and develop a small, reusable rocket by applying Honda's core technologies such as combustion, fluid, control and guidance technologies. Honda views the field of space technologies as a place to take on new challenges.
Keiji Ohtsu, President and Representative Director of Honda R&D Co., Ltd., is quoted as saying: "All of the initiatives we have announced are for the challenges Honda takes on in new areas, but the underlying passion of Honda to use our technology to make people's lives more enjoyable remains unchanged.
"Ever since the company's founding, the wellspring of Honda's challenges has always been the people at Honda who generate original technologies and ideas. Through the creation of new mobility, Honda will continue striving to change the value people place on mobility and make positive changes to our society."
