DAILY INNOVATION BRIEF by Maryanne Kane, Journalist

 DAILY INNOVATION BRIEF

                                                                      

                 By Journalists Edward Kane & Maryanne Kane

HONEYWELL FORECASTS FLYING TAXI BOOM

                                                            
                                        Source:  Lilium

• Honeywell International, the global technology company focused on aerospace & automotive innovations, is forecasting that flying taxis will be operating commercially by 2025 slowly at first but will be accelerating into a booming business by 2030
• First users of the eVTOLs, or electric vertical takeoff and landing vehicles, will be the military and cargo transportation companies
• Honeywell is one of the largest suppliers of military aircraft and equipment to the US government and is a big original equipment manufacturer (OEM) for the air taxi industry, with leading edge flying taxi customers like Lilium & more
• The company expects its share of the eVTOL business to hit $2 billion by 2030
• At an investor's conference today, the CEO of Honeywell's Aerospace Division Mike Madson sounded a very optimistic note on eVTOLs long term future, expecting them to become a key, innovative component of the global transportation system for consumers and industries.

MITSUBISHI'S MAGNIFICENT MOONSTONE CONCEPT

                                    Source:  Mitsubishi & IED

• Moonstone is a futuristic, all-electric SUV concept car for 2035, designed by IED graduate students (Insituto Europeo di Design) in conjunction with & for Mitsubishi
• The EV is nothing short of being gorgeous, fully electric with zero emissions & environmentally correct in many ways
• Moonstone is a 2-door coupe-SUV with a sporty, aerodynamic body that the designers call "a sculptured work of pure dynamics & astonishing technology"
• Some dramatic aspects:  windshield & windows blend into each other; LED head & tail lights are lightshows; Lidar mounted on the hood; dramatically inclined roofline; roof mounted wing & maximum use of sustainable materials throughout the EV
• Mitsubishi & IED say the EV promises "astonishing performance" from its fully electric powertrain and all-wheel drive capability
• This exceptional vehicle is a one-off design study that may, in some form, find its way into production, as many hope it will.

NEW RESEARCH: KIDS, EDUCATION & ROBOT TEACHERS

                         Source:  Concordia University & Nao

• Thought provoking, innovative research from Concordia University showing how savvy, smart & intuitive young kids are about teachers & learning, whether it's a robot teacher or a human teacher
• Test groups of 3- & 5-year-old pre-schoolers over Zoom meetings featured familiar objects like a book or ball that the robot teacher Nao named correctly but the human teacher, purposely for the research, did not
• Unfamiliar objects & other robots were also used in the study
• Initial testing indicates the 3-year-olds didn't differentiate between the two presentations - human & robotic
• But, the 5-year-olds identified & accepted the more competent teacher as a robot plus they understood that the robot is mechanical not a human
• Concordia researchers' conclusions:  "Pre-schoolers prefer to learn from a competent robot than an incompetent human"
• Also, & very importantly, this research is a precursor example of how robotic tech can be useful as a tool to facilitate learning.