Best, Weirdest and Most Notable Autos and Auto Tech at CES
Nearly half of this year’s Consumer Electronics Show was made up of products related, in one way or another, to the automobile, including the strange and quirky.
The Mercedes-Benz Vision AVTR was inspired by the film Avatar, its director James Cameron helping introduce the electric show car. Fully electric and autonomous - it doesn’t even have a steering wheel. It showcased some intriguing technology, including a control system that bionically links to the driver.
The Hyundai S-A1 isn’t your typical automotive concept vehicle. It’s a mock-up of a flying taxi, part of a new partnership between the Korean carmaker and Uber. If all goes according to plan, the ride-sharing giant wants to kick off its new flying taxi service, Uber Elevate, in three cities in 2023.
Read the article at The Detroit Bureau.
Hydrogen On The Rise At CES, From Drones And Daimler Trucks To Toyota’s City Of The Future
This year’s CES show indicates hydrogen, which has had a negligible impact as a clean fuel for passenger cars, is getting a new shot as a power source for heavy-duty trucks, buses, drones and cities.
Daimler has been working to commercialize fuel cell vehicles since the 1990s, and though it currently offers the F-Cell sport-utility vehicle in a few markets, the parent of Mercedes-Benz is shifting its focus to heavy trucks and buses, says R&D chief Markus Schäfer.
Toyota is applying decades of hydrogen R&D to serve as the core power source for “Woven City,” the futuristic neighborhood it plans to construct near Mount Fuji starting next year. Situated on the site of a shuttered Toyota assembly plant, it’s to be a showplace for clean tech, mobility experiments, AI-enabled everything and next-generation architecture that will be home to 2,000 residents.
Read the article at Forbes.
Sedan Fleet Managers: Avoid the EV Hype and Buy ‘Pure’ Hybrids
In the end, all-electric and plug-hybrids are both more expensive than pure hybrids and traditional gasoline-powered sedans
By Mark Boada, Executive Editor
Washington Post columnist Charles Lane ignited a bit of a firestorm among some readers with a December 30th piece that bore the headline, “Why electric cars still don't live up to the hype.”
Lane opened by noting that “For the past 10 years, I've waged a quixotic counteroffensive against electric-car boosterism, raining skepticism on the vehicles' potential to cure climate change, much less to be the clean, green wave of the transportation future.”
Make no mistake, we at Fleet Management Weekly are convinced that global warming is a critical issue and that one part of the solution involves dramatically increasing the fuel efficiency of all vehicles. But the question is, are fully electric vehicles the right choice for now or the near-term for the sedan components of fleets? It appears to this writer that for many if not most, the answer is no.
Uber And Hyundai Team Up To Put Flying Taxis In The Sky
At the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, the Uber and Hyundai revealed a model of a four-seat, electric flying vehicle that they said you'll be able to summon for a ride through Uber's app someday.
The first actual prototype will be ready in 2023, according to a Hyundai spokesperson. A human pilot will fly the air taxi until the companies finalize software to autonomously control it, the company said.
Hyundai is the latest big company to announce that it's developing a flying taxi for trips around cities and suburbs. Boeing's flying car prototype made its first autonomous flight in 2019 at a small airport outside Washington D.C. Google co-founder Larry Page has invested in several smaller startups, including Kitty Hawk and Opener, which are developing flying car technologies.
Read the article at CNN.
New Year, Safer Fleet
What interests the boss, fascinates and engages the workers!
By Ed Dubens, CEO/Founder of eDriving
Happy, healthy and successful New Year best wishes to all FMW readers! I hope you have entered 2020 well-rested and ready for an exciting year ahead.
The start of a new year is the ideal time to take check of the policies, standards and programs you have in place to help protect your employees who drive for work, and look at the ways you can improve your risk management approach in anticipation of your business plans for the new year.
Here’s my 10-point checklist to help ensure you and your drivers are on track for a safe and successful 2020.
