At the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) 2023 event in early January 2023, Qualcomm was revealed to be supplying chipsets for electric cars made by Sony and Honda.
With this chip, it is hoped that the price of electric cars can be even cheaper. Prototypes of the second electric car were showcased at the annual consumer technology fair in Las Vegas, USA. The car, dubbed the "Afeela" brand, is powered by the "brain" alias the latest electric car chipset made by Qualcomm, namely the Snapdragon Ride Flex.
Chief Executive of Sony Honda Mobility, Yasuhide Mizuno said that this chipset made by Qualcomm will support all the functions and features in the Afeela car in one piece of hardware.
Some of them include the automatic steering function, the main functions of the car such as the speedometer, battery, etc., as well as the entertainment function in the car.
Electric Car prices will be cheaper
Previously, an electric car had to be equipped with several different chips to carry out these functions. According to Qualcomm, the use of one chipset for various functions can reduce the cost of producing electric cars.
In addition to the main functions, the Snapdragon Ride Flex System-on-Chip (SoC) will also support the performance of various sensors in the car. Mizuno said that there are about 40 sensors that equip Afeela.
It is not stated in detail what the sensors are in the electric car. If each is equipped with a different processing chip. Of course, this will make the price of electric cars more expensive.
Afeela's electric car UI will be powered by the Unreal Engine 5 game engine, made by Epic Games, publisher and developer of the popular game Fortnite. Unreal Engine 5 is said to be used to display various animations and entertainment features on various screens in Afeela, as summarized from VentureBeat, Tuesday (10/1/2023).
The plan is for the electric car project by Sony and Honda to be enjoyed by the public through a real Afeela product in 2026. However, only the North American region can enjoy this electric car that year. Not yet certain whether later other countries will be able to try Afeela or not.
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