PARIS: Musician Jean-Michel Jarre will help Renault develop a unique audio experience for its future electric models. The idea is to develop a perfect audio system, but also to offer a sound atmosphere characteristic to each journey.
Visitors to the Viva Technology show here will be able to discover the beginnings of this work in the Scénic Vision concept today.
The rise of electric cars is completely changing our relationship to sound, both outside and inside the car.
And that's where Jean-Michel Jarre comes in, since the musician will be creating the new sound signature of Renault's future models.
This sound signature covers various things, including a welcome sequence when entering the car, the audio system in its entirety (components, location, algorithms), as well as the exterior sound emitted by the electric vehicle when traveling below 30kph, in order to alert pedestrians to its presence.
A first demonstration is unveiled with the Scénic Vision, which is billed as a pioneering concept car in terms of sustainable development.
The firm's "less is more" approach — or how to do better with less — is here applied to the sound experience, with the ambition to develop an audio system using a minimum of components, while delivering a new onboard experience.
In the Scénic Vision, this is achieved by a mid-bass speaker in each door, complemented by a system of so-called Sound Bubbles installed in each headrest. Passengers thus benefit from high quality, immersive and individual acoustics.
In addition, Jarre will participate in the creative development of the very first "Sonic Road" algorithm, a sort of ideal soundtrack for the driver's journey, drawing on the driver's musical tastes and contextual parameters such as places visited, landscapes, the weather or simply the time of day.
The Sound Bubbles and Sonic Road concepts are expected to be used in future electric cars.
