CES 2017: An emotional engine

Las Vegas – Honda unveiled its concept car, the NeuV, which will come equipped with an emotion engine.

• The NeuV has a personal artificially intelligent assistant, Hana (Honda Automated Network Assistant)
• The concept also imagines a future in which the car will be used as part of the sharing economy

When considering what a car of the future would look like, the team at Honda R&D wanted to create a vehicle that could be on the road in the next few years. To do that, they examined trends in technology in general and identified artificial intelligence as the key to making a better car.

Honda’s AI assistant, Hana, acts as an emotion engine that can read the facial expressions of drivers to determine what kind of mood they are in. Hana can then make recommendations based on their mood, such as playing a favourite song if the driver is in traffic.

The car can also help its owner make money. With an automated function, Hana can drop a driver off at work and then work as a ride-sharing service until the driver calls it back.