BMW debuted a concept car with real personality during its keynote presentation at CES 2023. This concept car is called the BMW i Vision Dee, with Dee standing for Digital Emotional Experience. The crisp white concept sedan took the stage alongside several celebrity vehicles famous for their personality, KITT from Knight Rider and number 53 livery Herbie from The Love Bug.
The point of having these celebrity cars alongside the BMW I Vision Dee was to promote one of the concept car’s key features – a “digital soul”. BMW’s vision for the future is vehicles that provide more than transportation, becoming a companion of sorts. A human actress behind the scenes provided the BMW i Vision Dee’s voice during the presentation, as the AI-tech is not quite there yet but offers a preview of BMW’s goal.
Besides creating a vehicle with a literal attitude, the BMW i Vision Dee showcased the full-color E Ink technology. This feature debuted at CES 2022, allowing the driver to change the vehicle’s exterior color from 32 options. The technology uses 240 individually controlled segments to generate patterns and multicolor schemes. In addition, BMW claims this feature only draws battery power when changing color to maintain low power consumption.
Another key feature of the BMW i Vision Dee is the lack of digital screens in the interior because the entire windshield is an AR heads-up display. Instead, this screen offers a Mixed Reality Slider operated by a touchscreen on the dashboard with five different levels. Each level increases the use of the windshield’s display, starting with basic driver info like battery range and navigation to level 5, which dims the side windows and converts the windscreen into a virtual reality simulator. The concept is that level 5 would only be used when the car is fully autonomous.
The BMW i Vision Dee is strictly a concept vehicle with no plans for production. Instead, it’s a vessel allowing us to preview what BMW has in store for us in the upcoming years. For example, BMW’s next-generation platform, Neue Klasse, is scheduled to launch in 2025 with a production sedan and a sports activity vehicle.
In other automotive news, check out the 2023 Aston Martin DB AR1 design by Zagato.