Sony Group to establish ‘Sony Mobility Inc.’ for EV business

To explore and accelerate its plans to venture into the mobility business, Sony Group Corporation will be establishing a dedicated operating company "Sony Mobility Inc." in the spring of this year. The announcement was made at the ongoing CES 2022 event, in which the company exhibited the latest prototype of its 'Vision-S' electric mobility project.

The group has hinted that the new company will aim to make the best use of AI and robotics technologies. Along with the VISION-S e-mobility solutions, together with the autonomous entertainment robot 'aibo', and the drone 'Airpeak', Sony seeks to create new value in a variety of fields towards sustainable digital and mobility ecosystem.

At the expo, an SUV-type prototype vehicle named 'VISION-S 02' was displayed. This is the second iteration of the company's EV platform under the Vision-S initiative that was launched at CES 2020.

Sony is already road-testing its earlier prototype (Vision-S 01) EVs in Europe, along with real-world evaluation of the safety and user experience of the imaging and sensing technology installed inside and outside the prototype vehicle, including the human-machine interface (HMI) system.

The latest Vision-S 02 uses the same vehicle and cloud platform as the Vision-S 01. By offering entertainment experiences utilizing the large interior space and variations of a 7-seater, this new variant accommodates a large variety of consumer lifestyles and diversified market requirements, the company said.

Further, the electric car is equipped with sensors installed 360 degrees around the vehicle, including high-sensitivity, high-resolution, wide dynamic range CMOS image sensors and LiDAR sensors that accurately sense three-dimensional space. The onboard system provides intuitive driver interaction and HMI functions for improved road sense and safety.

Sony aims to provide greater safety and comfort to passengers using its sensor and communication technologies and is currently conducting functional verification tests in Europe toward the release of Level 2+ advanced driver assistance systems (ADAS) on public roads.

Other tech-savvy features of Sony's concept car include 'Time-of-Flight' (ToF) sensors that support intuitive gesture and voice commands of the passengers, remote car operation for autonomous driving using 5G connectivity, '360 Reality audio', and 'Bravia Core' fully integrated digital video service.