Go for a walk, man: Sony's drive to create a car parked by partner Honda

Summary

Sony and Honda have broken up, meaning their joint vision to deliver a revolutionary electric vehicle won’t happen. The two Japanese giants decided to build a car together in 2022 and formed a company called “Sony Honda Mobility” (SHM) to make it happen. A year later the pair showed off their plans in a prototype called “Afeela” to which Honda provided automotive expertise, and Sony supplied imaging and sensing technology, telecommunications, networks, and the in-car entertainment experience. Afeela proposed a software-defined car that allowed drivers to customize the many interior displays with their preferred themes or apps created by third-party developers. SHM tossed around terms like Afeela becoming the "center of the mobility experience." Your correspondent has recently test-driven several electric vehicles and can report that designs similar to those SHM showed off in a 2023 video have made it into production in cars from other manufacturers. Sony and Honda therefore weren’t wildly outlandish outliers. But efforts to create Afeela weren’t rolling along happily, because yesterday SHM parked the car before it made it into production. “SHM today announced that it has decided to discontinue the development and launch of its first model, Afeela 1, and its second model of Afeela vehicles that had been under development,” according to a company statement. A change of heart by Honda was the main reason for the decision, because earlier this month decided to cancel three EVs it planned to sell in the USA. Honda blamed tariffs charged by the USA and the Trump administration’s decision to reduce incentives to buy electric cars for its decision to shift into reverse. The Japanese company also pointed to emerging Chinese EV-makers that it said are delivering better cars than Honda can make and gets them off the drawing board and onto the road faster. “In such a difficult competitive environment, Honda was unable to deliver products that offer value for money better than t...