Inside the car of the future with Nissan’s Invisible-to-Visible technology

Nissan and NTT DOCOMO have revealed that they are field testing the automaker’s Invisible-to-Visible (I2V) technology – unveiled January this year at the CES trade show in Las Vegas – in a moving vehicle at Grandrive, Nissan’s proving ground in Yokosuka, Japan.

Invisible-to-Visible technology seeks to merge the real and virtual worlds. The idea is to help the driver “see the invisible” – what’s coming up ahead, behind a building or around a corner – in order to anticipate any potential danger. This is achieved by combining information sourced from a host of sensors inside and outside the vehicle with data from the cloud.

The system also connects drivers and passengers to the Metaverse, a kind of virtual world in which people can interact through avatars. That means that individuals such as family members or friends can appear in the car at any moment as three-dimensional, augmented-reality avatars, to offer company or assistance.

In order to function, this technology requires 5G, which is provided by the Japanese operator partnering with the automaker on this project. Here, the high-speed, large-capacity, low-latency mobile 5G connectivity provided by DOCOMO is used to transmit avatar data wirelessly into the test vehicle, and in-car camera views from the vehicle, in real time. The test vehicle being used is based on the Nissan NV350 Caravan.