Kia to debut mood-sensing AI tech at CES 2019

Kia wants to make the motoring experience more pleasant in an autonomous era.

Kia is traveling to the 2019 Consumer Electronics Show to introduce a new range of technologies for the "post-autonomous driving era.”

The highlight of Kia's CES booth will be a new technology the automaker co-developed with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) Media Lab's Affective Computing group. Known as Real-time Emotion Adaptive Driving System (or R.E.A.D. for short), the in-cabin concept is designed to perk up a passenger's mood while riding in an autonomous pod.

According to Kia, R.E.A.D. uses intelligence-based bio-signal recognition technology to determine a "driver's” emotional state. The system can then tailor the interior environment to improve the driver's emotional state.

"We have developed R.E.A.D. System to create an interactive future mobility in-cabin space by converging cutting edge vehicle control technology and AI-based emotional intelligence,” said Mr. Albert Biermann, President and Head of Research & Development Division of Kia Motors. "Consequently, R.E.A.D. System will enable continuous communication between drivers and vehicles through the unspoken language of 'emotional feeling', thereby providing an optimized human senses-oriented space for drivers in real-time.”

The 2019 Consumer Electronics Show is scheduled to kick off on January 8.