The question of how important Silicon Valley has grown to become important to Honda these days can well be answered by the fact that this auto giant chose to commemorate its grand opening of a facility meant for expanded research development in Mountain View, California with the release of a brand new 2016 Honda Accord.
The 2016 Accord is not just any new car; however, the brains behind this massive creation describe it as the most high-tech Accord in the model’s history. Given the association of Silicon Valley with this new model, this description can hardly be doubted.
Honda is not new in Silicon Valley. In fact, this auto maker first came here back in 2000 when it had an R&D setup in San Francisco Bay. Now that Honda has sort of rededicated its newly expanded R&D plant is an indicator that it has fresh interest in incorporating some of the best features of the present technology into their highly sophisticated cars.
2016 Accord is the first Honda model to come with CarPlay and Android Auto
Honda hasn’t mentioned a thing about the price of the new 2016 Accord; however, what is known is that it will be the first of its kind to come with the latest version of Apple CarPlay and Android Auto. If you are familiar with most rides, you will agree that this combination is a bit new and weird. There have been cases of car makers experimenting with either of them in different smart cars, but never have there been a case where the two are in one car.
Other than the infotainment systems, the 2016 Accord will also be equipped with a flurry of other new technologies meant to help prevent car crushes. There is a complete suite of the Honda Sensing abilities, for instance, Lane Keeping Assist, Forward Collision Warning, Collision Mitigation Braking System, Adaptive Cruise Control, among many others.
While much might be centered on the new Honda 2016 Accord, there is more that took place down in Silicon Valley. The auto manufacturer setup a number of stations in the R&D plant just so as to highlight some of their ongoing technological projects, be it an internal one or in others they are partnering with companies around Silicon Valley. One of the stations setup showed demonstrations of how gesture-based controls on the new Accord 2016 model work. The Leap Motion sensor can detect certain gestures and in this way, a driver can easily select a device and shift its position simply by moving a hand, for instance, a side mirror.
Pedestrian sensing technologies were also tested during this grand opening. A bunch of Honda employees had to walk in front of a moving 2016 Accord just to demonstrate the effectiveness of the new model in recognizing objects on the road, for instance, cars, people, bicycles, and in the process it brakes automatically on behalf of the driver. Even though Honda denies its possible push into production of self-driven cars, the amount of driver-assisted technology incorporated into this new model says otherwise. The company claims that the motive behind this heavy technology is to eliminate all Honda accidents come 2050.
