Today we have both the economy class of cars as well as the luxury and performance segments. How will this classification fare in the age of EI cars? While speed might be a differentiating factor, what can more money buy?

Both economy and performance Emotionally Intelligent cars will continue to serve two different set of customers. While performance cars will have better power train, speed, safety, comfort, build quality and accessories, the economy class will offer better value for money.

With respect to the emotionally intelligence part, obviously the performance cars will perform better and hence will be equipped suitably.

In Cabin Sensors

The primary aspect of an EI car is obviously its sensors. Luxury segment vehicles will have a lot of sensors operating in different technologies such as cameras, Infra-red cameras, Radars, touch sensors, heart rate monitors, air quality monitors and so on. These sensors will continuously monitor the driver and passengers and will be able to understand even their tiniest gestures and emotions.

Exterior Sensors

On the external facing side, there will be powerful sensors that can work over a longer distance in the performance segment. Lidars, cameras and radars with higher accuracy, precision and range augmented by a wider V2X connectivity will enable the car to precisely map its environment. The car will also know more aspects of its own system such as weight, tyre pressure, fuel level, etc.

Processing Power

The performance segment will have a much formidable processing architecture – more CPU/GPU/TPU Cores, higher clock speeds and larger memories. With high vehicle bus bandwidth, it can carry humongous amount of data - from sensors to the AI Core and then the processed output to ECU’s and actuators. This will translate to a better driving control and in-turn a more aggressive car.

Better Algorithms

The performance segment cars will be first ones to ride the wave of advanced features of the Software Defined Vehicle architecture. They will run much complex and powerful algorithms that performs splendid sensor fusion to get a rounded view of both its occupants and environment. They will be able to offer its passengers a highly unique in-cabin and driving experience.

Customization

Just like today, the performance and luxury segment cars will be highly customizable limited only by the buyers’ imagination and budget. You can choose the number of computing elements, quantity and quality of the sensors, extent and span of the HMI, and so on. You may even be able to opt for a dynamic skin with which the car can match its colour with your outfits.

On top of these, with better show-off features, performance segment will redefine the emotional intelligence of the car as the economy segment catches up feature by feature.