Sony Honda Electric Vehicles May Include PS5 Hardware

Anyone who purchases one of Sony Honda’s new electric vehicles may also get a PS5 as a standard feature.

As the Financial Times reports(Opens in a new window), Sony is developing an EV that has a focus on entertaining occupants with music, movies, and video games. Rather than relying on a generic hardware/software solution, Sony wants to take advantage of its existing hardware and technology to offer a premium experience rivals will find it hard to compete with.

It’s something the joint venture hinted at last month with talk of integrating real and virtual worlds as part of the experience.

Izumi Kawanishi, head of Sony’s AI robotics business explained, “Sony has content, services and entertainment technologies that move people. We are adapting these assets to mobility, and this is our strength against Tesla … Tesla is not providing any content services.” He also pointed to future vehicles produced by Apple and Google as key competitors.

When asked about the PS5 console, Kawanishi said that integrating the gaming hardware into EVs is “technologically possible.” Such a decision would pave the way for the latest PS5 games to be available on launch day in Sony Honda vehicles. Honda’s Yasuhide Mizuno also confirmed that these EVs are being developed as a hardware platform to provide entertainment.

The person in the driver’s seat would also be able to enjoy this premium entertainment experience because Sony and Honda are just as focused on producing a self-driving car.

The first Sony Honda vehicles are slated to arrive in the US in 2026, with pre-orders opening in 2025. By then, Sony will have performed a few more design iterations on the PS5 hardware and likely shrunk it in size and reduced its power draw significantly. That’s good news for the vehicle designers who will want the smallest board possible to hide behind the dash along with all the other electronics modern vehicles rely on.

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