Hyundai Motors’ Smart Mobility Display Has Aerial Mobility on Center Stage

Hyundai Motors Group has stood up a Smart Mobility display at their HMG headquarters to showcase the next generation of transportation innovations. Featured predominantly, front and center of this display was an aerial mobility aircraft prototype, flying over the model scape.

Visitors take in the Hyundai Smart Mobility Display. Image // Hyundai

This display represents Hyundai’s financial commitment to the aerial mobility industry and to the application of the technologies developed through their extensive research and development efforts toward electrified and autonomous transportation. The display will remain for roughly another month, until mid June, after which it’ll be toured at various events across the glove. Hyundai appointed their current Executive Vice President of the Urban Air Mobility Division, Dr. Jaiwon Shin to his post last September.

Hyundai has allocated the vehicle and hub model to their future transportation approach, dubbing the vehicles that transport persons as PBV’s (Purpose Built Vehicles) and the locations at which many of these interfaces occur as Hubs. Their fundamental approach asserts that the correct proportion of hubs and passenger carrying capacity of PBV’s will enable for a reduction in congestion and lowered emissions to boot. When combined with UAM efforts, the three facets of this mobility plan cover the needs of short (>2 miles), medium (2-10 miles), and medium-long (10-50 miles) in range trips that are common among urban areas.

Why it’s important: Hyundai’s establishment as a massive powerhouse amongst the competitive global auto making market allow the company to make large commitments of their R&D dollars for application to emerging technologies that may require 10-20 years to reach large scale commercial deployment. However, this long-tail investment is growing in levels of commonality among other next generation transportation systems as the foundational technologies that allow for autonomous, on demand transportation continue to mature. Some examples include electric motors, see and avoid technology and coding, flight computers or driving guidance computers, and composite fabrication technology are common to the aircraft and vehicles of tomorrow.

Source // Hyundai Motor Group, Autocar Professional