Car News

The newly arrived Lexus UX range will be available with Apple CarPlay and Android Auto in Australia before the end of the year, the Japanese luxury marque has confirmed. Following the debut of the smartphone mirroring technology (for Lexus in Australia, at least) with the facelifted RX sometime in the fourth quarter of 2019, the entry-level UX will be the second model in the brand’s range locally to get the feature.

Hyundai is working with a Korean artificial intelligence (AI) specialist on technology capable of diagnosing injuries after a car accident. Using inbuilt sensors, Hyundai says the system will quickly (within seven seconds of impact) build a picture of what's happening in the cabin after a crash, before sharing that information – and information about which safety systems activated in the car – with emergency services.

Michelin is working with General Motors (GM) on a tyre called the Unique Puncture-proof Tyre System, handily abbreviated to Uptis, which could be ready for production by 2024. At the moment, the Uptis Prototype is being put through its paces in a controlled environment on the Chevrolet Bolt, but the companies will move into the real world later this year.

Jaguar Land Rover has taken a regular, everyday heated steering wheel and turned the technology on its head. Rather than roasting your palms on a chilly morning, the Sensory Steering Wheel uses two heating elements to tell drivers when and where to turn. Developed alongside Glasgow University, the wheel has elements on both sides of the wheel capable of warming or cooling its section by six degrees. Driver would be able to control how warm the wheel gets, if that's too much.

Dr Ken Washington, Ford's chief technology officer, unveiled the Digit delivery robot via post on the company's Medium blog. Developed and built by Agility Robotics, Digit is said answer the question of how to get packages from autonomous delivery vans into the hands, or at least the doorstep, of its recipient. With only about 1% of American homes being wheelchair accessible, a wheeled robot was not seen as being a feasible solution.