Sony Honda Mobility (SHM), the joint venture between the two Japanese companies, has released a teaser of a vehicle it plans to unveil at CES 2023 in Las Vegas on January 4.
Likely a preview of the company's first electric vehicle, the video shows glimpses of a car's hood and rear lower door areas. Unfortunately, there's not much to comment about what the video shows other than the hood is rather short and aerodynamic and the doors have metal trim on their lower parts.
There's not much info either, as the video is titled "See you in Las Vegas on January 4, 2023," and the description reads "Sign up for the reveal of our new world." Now, since SHM's goal is to start deliveries of its first production car in 2026, the vehicle that is being teased for CES 2023 is likely a concept version.
As you probably know, Sony has unveiled two concept vehicles so far, the Vision-S 01 sedan at CES 2020 and the Vision-S 02 SUV at CES 2022. Could this new debut be an evolution of any of them? We can't rule that out because both have a similar-looking hood to the one shown in the video.
That said, the Vision-S 01 appears to be a better match seeing as its plastic door trim element has about the same shape and height as the metal piece in the video.
Obviously, that's just speculation and SHM could just as well reveal an entirely new vehicle. However, Sony has invested a lot of money in these concepts—the Vision-S 01 has been tested intensively since its debut—and it doesn't seem logical to let all of that go to waste.
Gallery: Check Sony's Vision-S Concept At The 2020 CES
As announced yesterday, Sony Honda Mobility plans to manufacture its first EV at an unnamed Honda plant in North America. Preorders for its first electric vehicle are planned to begin in the first half of 2025, with sales to follow before the end of 2025. Deliveries should start in spring 2026 in the US, followed by Japan in the second half of 2026. Sony and Honda are also considering a launch for Europe, but no plan has been set yet.
The new EV will be a premium product equipped with a new software system developed by Sony that will open up the possibility of recurring revenue from entertainment and other services that would be billed monthly. Sony will also supply much of the car's cloud-based systems, electronics, infotainment and sensors that help deliver Level 3 automated driving.
Retailing will be centered around online sales, following Honda's experimenting with that model in Japan.
Gallery: Sony Vision-S 02 SUV Concept
