Watch Rivian test its R1T electric truck in extreme cold weather
If Rivian's R1T is going to live up to its electric adventure truck image, it's going to have to survive conditions that could leave other EVs crying for mercy... and it might just manage that. As Electrek notes, the startup has shared details and a video of winter weather testing in Baudette, Minnesota, where the temperatures dipped to -40F — cold enough to pose a serious problem for many EV batteries. It won't surprise you to hear the R1T passed the test (Rivian might not have posted this otherwise), but the dry run showed that the truck's unique warming technology worked.
Instead of using dedicated heaters that further drain the battery, Rivian relies on a central cold plate that uses relatively little energy to keep battery cells warm enough for ideal performance. That slows the initial charge if you've forgotten to plug in on a frigid day (your charging rate will be cut in half for roughly an hour), but it should get your R1T to full performance in about 20 minutes.
The winter testing also gave Rivian a chance to confirm that algorithms for traction control worked properly in winter, including in thick snow and on ice.
The details are clearly meant to sell would-be R1T buyers on the truck's year-round usefulness ahead of its debut later in 2021. It's also important to stress that rivals are improving as well. Tesla, for instance, has built heat pumps into recent cars (mainly the Model Y and newer Model 3 units) to improve their performance in chilly conditions.
At the same time, the post illustrates how much EVs have improved in recent years — they're no longer aimed solely at people in balmy climates where freezing temperatures are rare. That will be crucial if EVs are going to enter the mainstream and appeal to everyone, even if early examples like the $75,000 R1T are out of reach for most people.
Article source: https://www.engadget.com/rivian-r1t-electric-truck-cold-weather-testing-171527674.html
Social media bots may have fuelled the GameStop stock frenzy
The GameStop stock frenzy appears to largely have been the product of Reddit users and trading apps like Robinhood, but some of its contributors might not have been human. According to Reuters, cybersecurity firm PiiQ Media has determined that people were using social media bots to promote GameStop, Dogecoin and other "meme" investments. Posts on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and YouTube hopped on trading keywords like GME (GameStop's stock symbol) and "hold the line," starting around the opening of trading and surging toward the end.
There are tens of thousands such accounts, PiiQ said.
It's not certain who's behind the bots, or how effective they've been. Reddit chief Steve Huffman told Congress at a hearing that he didn't think bots played a "significant role" in the stock buying spree, although his ability to track bots outside of Reddit is limited.
The new findings may raise concerns all the same. While the Reddit activity appears to have been aimed at punishing short sellers and otherwise riding a wave of hype (much to the chagrin of some investors), the bots raise the possibility that malicious actors either piggybacked on the GameStop campaign or could manipulate the market in the future. Social sites might have to step up their efforts to remove bots going forward.
Article source: https://www.engadget.com/social-media-bots-gamestop-stocks-182411035.html
Scientists sequence 64 human genomes to better reflect genetic diversity
The Human Genome Project shed light on our species in 2001, but it was a patchwork of different humans' genes that didn't really reflect humanity's genetic makeup. Flash forward 20 years, however, and science is taking a significant leap forward. Researchers have revealed a new dataset of 64 sequenced full human genomes that should better reflect genetic diversity. Until now, scientists have typically looked at small genetic changes — this could spot broader structural differences.
The new reference point covers 25 different human populations. Crucially, it doesn't borrow from the Human Genome Project's original material and should highlight differences as a consequence.
There are limitations. The team warned that its genome sequencing still didn't cover the "full spectrum" of gene structure variations, leaving gaps in coverage. Technological developments in combining data should help, but it could be a long while before there's a complete picture of the differences between human populations.
Even so, the dataset should prove extremely useful for medicine. It could help pinpoint genetic predispositions toward diseases and other health conditions, leading to deeper understandings of health issues that disproportionately effect certain groups. That, in turn, could lead to more effective treatments that truly serve the whole human population, not just certain parts of it.
Article source: https://www.engadget.com/sequence-64-human-genomes-genetic-diversity-195605887.html
Lordstown Motors’ electric race truck is (mostly) ready for off-roading
Lordstown Motors wants to prove its Endurance electric truck is ready for the wilderness through a familiar strategy: it's entering a prominent race. Autoblog reports that Lordstown has unveiled a race-ready version of its Endurance Beta truck that will compete in the SCORE World Desert Championship's San Felipe 250 on April 17th. The upgraded EV is ready for the Mexican race with larger off-road wheels (complete with wider fender flares), four high-power driving lights and the removal of 'frills' like mirrors, windows and much of the cabin's luxuries.
The race will ideally prove that the Endurance is the "toughest, most robust" truck on the planet even as it cuts emissions, company chief Steve Burns claimed.
If all goes well, the Lordstown racer could provide further evidence that electric trucks are ready for extreme conditions. If they can handle the bumps and bruises of off-roading, you might be more likely to buy an Endurance for your own off-the-beaten-path excursions.
The competition might underscore the current limitations of EVs, however. The race covers a 290-mile course, but the street-going Endurance has a range of just 250 miles. Even with weight reductions, there's a real chance the racing variant will have to recharge mid-race while its competitors pass by. Lordstown is unlikely to win, then — until it improves its vehicles' range, this is more a proof of capability than a realistic bid for motorsport glory.
Article source: https://www.engadget.com/lordstown-motors-endurance-race-truck-214135593.html
Volkswagen is using its electric ID.Buzz van to test self-driving tech
Volkswagen at one time said its electric ID.Buzz van would reach dealerships by 2022 (that announcement has been removed but you can view it in the Internet Archive), but news from its commercial division confirms that at least an unveiling is still on deck for next year. Beyond that, VW autonomous driving exec Christian Senger said "This year, for the first time, we are conducting field trials in Germany, in which the self-driving system by Argo AI will be used in a version of the future ID. BUZZ by Volkswagen Commercial Vehicles."
Argo AI is the autonomous driving technology that Ford and VW have partnered to invest in and develop. The commercial vehicles team is developing vans to use the self-driving tech in that are based on the ID.Buzz to power a ride-hailing and pooling concept with autonomous vans that can operate in urban areas.
With the announcement VW also released this concept sketch (above) of the self-driving test vehicle that Germans may see on roads any moment now. LIDAR sensors are visible on the corners and a roof-mounted bulge should hold more tech to help the van sense its surroundings. As Autoblog notes, this concept doesn't have the retro-themed two ton color scheme we've seen in previous ID.Buzz releases, but we'll have to wait for the reveal to see how it pays homage to VW vans from the past.
Article source: https://www.engadget.com/vw-id-buzz-autonomous-110304889.html
The Morning After: MSI’s latest gaming laptop targets the 1440p sweet spot
Years after 3D's last invasion has receded from the public sphere, it’s notable that some of the most favorable implementations happened on mobile devices. To mark the ten-year anniversary of the Nintedo 3DS launch in Japan, Engadget editors chimed in with a few memories of their favorite games.
Still, Kris Naudus wants you to know that the portable system’s best feature had nothing to do with 3D. Instead she focused on StreetPass, Nintendo’s pre-contact tracing social feature that passively traded information between systems whenever they got close to one another. If you weren’t living in a densely populated area and taking your 3DS on public transportation every day, it’s interesting to see what the experience was like when all the elements came together.
— Richard Lawler
MSI GS66 Stealth review (2021)
The gaming sweetspot comes to laptops.
MSI's latest GS66 Stealth is one of the first gaming notebooks with a 240Hz 1440p (or 2K) screen. As Devindra Hardawar explains, that means you don’t have to choose between 1080p screens that don’t seem quite sharp enough or 4K displays that add battery drain and strain mobile GPUs. The only problem? MS hasn’t finalized pricing on this unit, and the fan noise was a bit loud, but with competitors close to releasing similar devices this is a space to watch in 2021.
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Netflix is making a Terminator anime with the studio behind 'Ghost in the Shell'
Yes, Production I.G. is working on another new series for Netflix.
A Terminator anime from the legendary studio behind the Ghost in the Shell franchise is coming to Netflix. The streaming giant didn't share any details on the plot, but showrunner Mattson Tomlin, who worked on Project Power for Netflix, told Variety he plans to approach the franchise in a way that "breaks conventions, subverts expectations and has real guts.” My big question? Who is this Redditor that suggested the project a year ago, and what else did they see in their crystal ball?
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Google offers improved sleep tracking tools for Android apps
The Sleep As Android developer collaborated on this project.
If you woke up looking for more information on how to get a good night’s sleep, and you use Android, then stay tuned. Google has opened up a Sleep API for third-party apps to use that surfaces info on a user’s sleep without using a lot of battery power. An on-device AI model uses the light and motion sensors to pull in data, which the apps can access if a user grants it the Physical Activity Recognition runtime permission.
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This week's best deals: $200 off the Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra and more
The 55-inch CX OLED is down to a record-low price.
While Nintendo's Mario Kart Live: Home Circuit is $10 off, Amazon knocked the prices of all of Samsung's Galaxy S21 smartphones down by hundreds. Those handsets just came out last month, making now a good time to grab one if you've been meaning to upgrade.
Here are all the best deals from the week that you can still snag today, and remember to follow @EngadgetDeals on Twitter for more updates.
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The Engadget Podcast
NASA’s Mars Perseverance Rover has landed! Now what?
This week, Devindra and Cherlynn chat with PhD candidate and all-around space nerd Sophia Gad-Nasr about NASA’s Mars Perseverance Rover. We dive into what it’s journey was like, what was so remarkable about its landing, and what it’ll be working on in the future. Also, we chat about the new PSVR headset, the death of Fry’s Electronics and Cinefex magazine, and more!
Listen on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Pocket Casts or Stitcher.
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'Next-gen' USPS vehicles can use gas or electric motors
The plan is to build up to 165,000 of these and put them on the road starting in 2023.
This is the next-generation USPS van, which will replace an aging fleet of vehicles powered by gas engines that can barely crack 10 MPG. The Postal Service announced that its 10-year, multi-billion-dollar modernization plan will revolve around these slightly cartoony vehicles, built by a company called Oshkosh Defense, which usually produces tactical vehicles for the military.
The Next Generation Delivery Vehicle (NGDV) doesn’t have turrets or gun racks, but it does have air conditioning, blind-spot warning, automatic braking and a back-up camera. Most notably, however, is the option of an electric powertrain, which the USPS claims allows for upgrades in the future as technology improves.
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But wait, there’s more...
NASA reveals video of Perseverance's landing on Mars
Virgin Galactic delays space tourism flights to early 2022
'Terraria' will hit Stadia after all
Right-wing site Gab responds to 'alleged' data breach
Netflix's first 'Shadow and Bone' trailer shows off the fantasy world of Ravka
Survival game 'Valheim' sold four million copies in three weeks of early access
Sony's FX3 is a compact $3,900 camera for filmmakers
Streaming music made up 83 percent of the record industry's revenue in 2020
'Pokémon Diamond' and 'Pearl' remakes are arriving on Switch later this year
SpaceX's first private flight will carry the youngest ever American to orbit
Hyundai's striking Ioniq 5 delivers long range and brisk performance
ThinkPad X1 Nano review: Light and mighty but doesn't last
Article source: https://www.engadget.com/msi-gs66-stealth-tma-154528529.html
OnePlus will reportedly launch its ‘9R’ phone and watch in March
OnePlus may have a particularly busy March. Well-known tipster Ishan Agarwal told 91Mobiles that OnePlus will reportedly unveil at least four devices in March, including a lower-cost 9R smartphone (you're looking at the 8T above) as well as the standard 9, the 9 Pro and the company's previously teased smartwatch. While Agarwal doesn't have new specs to share for either the 9R or the watch, it comes just days after Evan Blass found web evidence of the 9R name.
The 9R was previously rumored as a 9E or 9 Lite and might straddle the gap between OnePlus' usual flagships and budget devices like the Nord N series. It wouldn't bowl anyone over with its 6.5-inch 90Hz display, Snapdragon 690 chip or 64MP main camera, but it might offer more RAM and battery (8GB and 5,000mAh respectively) than the Nord N10's 6GB of memory and 4,300mAh battery pack. The 9 and 9 Pro are both expected to include smoother 120Hz displays, more powerful Snapdragon 888 chips and upgraded camera tech (if at lower resolutions), so you'd still have a clear incentive to spend extra if your budget allows.
The OnePlus watch, meanwhile, could be a circular Wear OS watch that shares some common ground with the Oppo Watch RX.
If the claims are accurate, you could expect OnePlus to start teasing the 9R, the watch and other offerings in the near future. It's safe to say this would be the largest OnePlus launch yet — it would have four new major products and a full range of phones covering most use cases. Whether or not fans will be happy is another story (a compromised 9R device doesn't exactly scream "Never Settle"), but they at least won't be hurting for choice.
Article source: https://www.engadget.com/oneplus-9-r-9-pro-watch-march-launch-162029231.html
Hitting the Books: The Brooksian revolution that led to rational robots
We are living through an AI renaissance thought wholly unimaginable just a few decades ago — automobiles are becoming increasingly autonomous, machine learning systems can craft prose nearly as well as human poets, and almost every smartphone on the market now comes equipped with an AI assistant. Oxford professor Michael Woolridge has spent the past quarter decade studying technology. In his new book, A Brief History of Artificial Intelligence, Woolridge leads readers on an exciting tour of the history of AI, its present capabilities, and where the field is heading into the future.
Excerpted from A Brief History of Artificial Intelligence. Copyright © 2021 by Michael Woolridge. Excerpted by permission of Flatiron Books, a division of Macmillan Publishers. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
Robots and Rationality
In his 1962 book, The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, the philosopher Thomas Kuhn argued that, as scientific understanding advances, there will be times when established scientific orthodoxy can no longer hold up under the strain of manifest failures. At such times of crisis, he argued, a new orthodoxy will emerge and replace the established order: the scientific paradigm will change. By the late 1980s, the boom days of expert systems were over, and another AI crisis was looming. Once again, the AI community was criticized for overselling ideas, promising too much, and delivering too little. This time, the paradigm being questioned was not just the “Knowledge is power” doctrine that had driven the expert systems boom but the basic assumptions that had underpinned AI since the 1950s, symbolic AI in particular. The fiercest critics of AI in the late 1980s, though, were not outsiders but came from within the field itself.
The most eloquent and influential critic of the prevailing AI paradigm was the roboticist Rodney Brooks, who was born in Australia in 1954. Brooks’s main interest was in building robots that could carry out useful tasks in the real world. Throughout the early 1980s, he began to be frustrated with the then prevailing idea that the key to building such robots was to encode knowledge about the world in a form that could be used by the robot as the basis for reasoning and decision-making. He took up a faculty position at MIT in the mid-1980s and began his campaign to rethink AI at its most fundamental level.
THE BROOKSIAN REVOLUTION
To understand Brooks’s arguments, it is helpful to return to the Blocks World. Recall that the Blocks World is a simulated domain consisting of a tabletop on which are stacked a number of different objects—the task is to rearrange the objects in certain specified ways. At first sight, the Blocks World seems perfectly reasonable as a proving ground for AI techniques: it sounds like a warehouse environment, and I daresay exactly this point has been made in many grant proposals over the years. But for Brooks, and those that came to adopt his ideas, the Blocks World was bogus for the simple reason that it is simulated, and the simulation glosses over everything that would be difficult about a task like arranging blocks in the real world. A system that can solve problems in the Blocks World, however smart it might appear to be, would be of no value in a warehouse, because the real difficulty in the physical world comes from dealing with issues like perception, which are completely ignored in the Blocks World: it became a symbol of all that was wrong and intellectually bankrupt about the AI orthodoxy of the 1970s and 1980s. (This did not stop research into the Blocks World, however: you can still regularly find research papers using it to the present day; I confess to have written some myself.)
Brooks had become convinced that meaningful progress in AI could only be achieved with systems that were situated in the real world: that is, systems that were directly in some environment, perceiving it and acting upon it. He argued that intelligent behavior can be generated without explicit knowledge and reasoning of the kind promoted by knowledge-based AI in general and logic-based AI in particular, and he suggested instead that intelligence is an emergent property that arises from the interaction of an entity in its environment. The point here is that, when we contemplate human intelligence, we tend to focus on its more glamorous and tangible aspects: reasoning, for example, or problem solving, or playing chess. Reasoning and problem solving might have a role in intelligent behavior, but Brooks and others argued that they were not the right starting point from which to build AI.
Brooks also took issue with the divide-and-conquer assumption that had underpinned AI since its earliest days: the idea that progress in AI research could be made by decomposing intelligent behavior into its constituent components (reasoning, learning, perception), with no attempt to consider how these components worked together.
Finally, he pointed out the naivety of ignoring the issue of computational effort. In particular, he took issue with the idea that all intelligent activities must be reduced to ones such as logical reasoning, which are computationally expensive.
As a student working on AI in the late 1980s, it seemed like Brooks was challenging everything I thought I knew about my field. It felt like heresy. In 1991, a young colleague returning from a large AI conference in Australia told me, wide-eyed with excitement, about a shouting match that had developed between Ph.D. students from Stanford (McCarthy’s home institute) and MIT (Brooks’s). On one side, there was established tradition: logic, knowledge representation, and reasoning. On the other, the outspoken, disrespectful adherents of a new AI movement—not just turning their backs on hallowed tradition but loudly ridiculing it.
While Brooks was probably the highest-profile advocate of the new direction, he was by no means alone. Many other researchers were reaching similar conclusions, and while they did not necessarily agree on the smaller details, there were a number of commonly recurring themes in their different approaches.
The most important was the idea that knowledge and reasoning were deposed from their role at the heart of AI. McCarthy’s vision of an AI system that maintained a central symbolic, logical model of its environment, around which all the activities of intelligence orbited, was firmly rejected. Some moderate voices argued that reasoning and representation still had a role to play, although perhaps not a leading role, but more extreme voices rejected them completely.
It is worth exploring this point in a little more detail. Remember that the McCarthy view of logical AI assumes that an AI system will continually follow a particular loop: perceiving its environment, reasoning about what to do, and then acting. But in a system that operates in this way, the system is decoupled from the environment.
Take a second to stop reading this book, and look around. You may be in an airport departure lounge, a coffee shop, on a train, in your home, or lying by a river in the sunshine. As you look around, you are not disconnected from your environment and the changes that the environment is undergoing. You are in the moment. Your perception—and your actions—are embedded within and in tune with your environment.
The problem is, the knowledge-based approach doesn’t seem to reflect this. Knowledge-based AI assumes that an intelligent system operates through a continual perceive-reason-act loop, processing and interpreting the data it receives from its sensors; using this perceptual information to update its beliefs; reasoning about what to do; performing the action it then selects; and starting its decision loop again. But in this way, an AI system is inherently decoupled from its environment. In particular, if the environment changes after it has been observed, then it will make no difference to our knowledge-based intelligent system, which will stubbornly continue as though nothing had changed. You and I are not like that. For these reasons, another key theme at the time was the idea that there should be a close-coupled relationship between the situation that the system finds itself in and the behavior that it exhibits.
Article source: https://www.engadget.com/hitting-the-books-a-brief-history-of-artificial-intelligence-michael-woolridge-flatiron-books-163056905.html
ICYMI: We check out Lenovo’s lightest ThinkPad yet
This week we spent some time testing Lenovo’s Thinkpad X1 Nano — the company's thinnest and lightest ThinkPad at under two pounds. As usual, slimming things down comes with some trade offs, and Cherlynn Low tells us where the X1 Nano might leave you hanging. We also played around with the Poly Effects Beebo, an ambitious virtual modular synth in guitar-pedal form that Terrence O’Brien says is no more difficult to use than a smartphone. And Nicole Lee let the Amazon Echo Show 10’s rotating display follow her around her kitchen to find out if that new (and somewhat creepy) feature is worth paying $250 for.
The Thinkpad X1 Nano is impressively slim, but doesn't last long
Lenovo’s Thinkpad line is known for reliable performance, excellent keyboards and long-lasting batteries. The company’s new X1 Nano, which has a refreshed design and improved display, is noteworthy for weighing less than two pounds and for being one of the first laptops to meet Intel’s Evo certification. Cherlynn Low found a lot to like about the $1,399 laptop, namely its 11th-generation, 2.1GHz Intel Core i7 processor, 16GB of RAM, physical webcam shutter and 16:10 display
The X1 Nano is nearly identical to the X1 Carbon, and like all Thinkpad laptops, it meets military spec standards (MIL-STD-810H), making it quite durable. The display is a 2K panel that supports Dolby Vision and tops out at 450 nits of brightness, but doesn’t have touchscreen capabilities. It also has Dolby Atmos speakers, which Cherlynn found surprisingly loud, and four, 360-degree microphones that are intended to improve audio quality during video conferences. However in this case, the trade-off for getting a light and thin laptop is battery life: Cherlynn was able to eek just about 9 hours out of this machine.
The Poly Effects Beebo is an ambitious virtual modular synth
Poly Effects actually released the Beebo earlier this year, but the company recently merged the firmware with its other modular pedal, the Digit. This, according to Terrence O’Brien, has created one super pedal that’s basically a virtual modular synthesizer in a guitar-pedal format. The Beebo has a 5-inch touchscreen, which puts it on the smaller side, and Terrence said if you can use a smartphone, you'll likely be able to figure out this device.
In testing, Terrence said it was a versatile and complex touchscreen guitar pedal that’s easy to navigate with a bright interface and small, attractive icons. However, he found that some of the modules were a bit inconsistent and he ended up using the amp sim, cab sim and convolution reverb modules the most. The one glaring hole in the lineup is the lack of a looper. That being said, he found joy in experimenting with the Beebo and, despite its bugs, found it a wholly unique and powerful piece of gear.
Amazon’s 3rd-gen Echo Show 10 moves with you
Nicole Lee admits she was skeptical about the new Amazon Echo Show 10. The device looks different from previous models in that it has a display stuck onto a swiveling base, which enables it to turn and follow users so its screen is always in view. It’s also expensive at $250, making it more of an investment than the $130 Echo Show 8. However, after testing it in her kitchen, Nicole says she found the swiveling feature more useful than she thought it would be (albeit a bit creepy at first).
The Echo Show 10 has a 6.7-inch base and a 9.9-inch display, which means it takes up a fair amount of space — plus, it needs room to swivel around. Nicole said she found it best for watching videos since you’ll never miss an important moment with the screen always in view. She used it a lot to follow recipe instructions since she could keep track of things while moving around the kitchen to grab ingredients or wash her hands. The Echo Show 10 was smart enough to keep her and her husband in the frame, and to refocus on her when he left the frame. But in practice, the panning and zooming features were sometimes inconsistent and, as an Amazon device, it lacks functionality with some Google apps like YouTube and Nest cameras.
MSI’s GS66 Stealth is a solid step towards 1440p gaming on laptops
On the outside, the MSI GS66 Stealth doesn’t look that much different from last year’s model. It still has the same slim and sturdy aluminum frame, 4.6-pound weight, solid selection of ports, LED back-lit keyboard and large trackpad. However, it now includes NVIDIA’s new RTX 30-series GPUs and a 2K screen, making it one of the first gaming notebooks with such a panel. This middle ground between a 1080p and a 4K display provides a sharp picture and the upgraded GPU provides a fast refresh rate that makes for smoother gameplay.
Devindra Hardawar took the new model for a spin and was pleased by the results of his battery testing, an area in which many gaming laptops falter. The GS66 Stealth lasted 8 hours and 25 minutes during our benchmark test, which is an hour more than last year’s model. However, it’s not necessarily every gamer’s dream machine: he found the keyboard to be a bit mushy when typing, and the 1440p resolution isn’t the most ideal for streaming video. Also, like most gaming laptops, the GS66 Stealth gets pretty warm on the underside. But the biggest drawback by far are the fans, which were loud enough for Devindra to recommend using a headset while pushing the machine to its limits.
Article source: https://www.engadget.com/icymi-we-check-out-lenovos-lightest-thinkpad-yet-170044772.html
Nissan’s improved hybrid car system reduces CO2 emissions
Nissan has announced that it has achieved a 50 percent thermal efficiency for its next-generation e-Power hybrid technology. As RoadShow explains, most modern gasoline engines have a thermal efficiency of around 40 percent — in other words, only 40 percent of the energy they create upon burning fuel is transformed into motion. The rest gets turned into waste, such as heat and emissions, which means its technology can potentially lead to lower emissions.
The automaker was able to achieve a higher thermal efficiency, because its e-Power system doesn't work like conventional gas engines — it doesn't power the car itself and instead acts as a dedicated electricity generator for the technology's e-powertrain. That means the engine can run at its most efficient range all the time, allowing it to efficiently burn a more diluted air-fuel mixture at a high compression ratio. In conventional engines, the air-fuel dilution varies depending on various operational conditions.
Toshihiro Hirai, senior vice president of Nissan's powertrain and EV engineering division, told reporters:
"It took 50 years to increase thermal efficiency (of conventional engines) from 30% to 40%. But with e-Power, we can increase it to 50% in several years. That has been the target for the engineering community,” he said, describing that level as the "ultimate, challenging goal'."
Nissan previously said that it's aiming to have an electrified version of all its new models in major markets by the early 2030s and that it's hoping to achieve carbon neutrality by 2050. "Nissan's electrification strategy promotes the development of e-powertrains and high-performance batteries for EVs, with e-Power representing another important strategic pillar," Hirai said. The company has yet to announce when it would launch the e-Power system with 50 percent efficiency, but it launched the all-new Note powered by the current version of e-Power in Japan back in December.
Article source: https://www.engadget.com/nissan-improved-e-power-engine-172022135.html