BMW took advantage of CES 2022 to announce a number of new products. One of the great highlights of the German giant was the SUV iX Flow, which brings the unusual technology for changing the color of the body, something unprecedented in the industry and which promises to revolutionize the market in a few years.
According to the automaker, this was possible thanks to the E Ink technology, installed in the SUV’s housing. This resource contains millions of microcapsules with a diameter equivalent to the thickness of a human hair. Each of these microcapsules contains negatively charged white pigments and positively charged black pigments, which can be changed at the driver’s command.
“This gives the driver the freedom to express different facets of their personality or even the pleasure of changing externally, and to redefine that every time they sit in the car,” said Stella Clarke, project leader for the BMW iX Flow with E Ink.
In a demonstration made through a live presentation on the afternoon of Wednesday (5), it was really amazing to see a car change color as if by magic. However, anyone who thinks that this technology is merely aesthetic is wrong.
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As is well known, the color of the car can influence the internal temperature, and E Ink predicted this benefit with its different shades of white and black. And since we’re talking about an electric car, each kWh of energy counts. Therefore, if the vehicle is traveling in a warmer city, it is advisable to make the iX Flow color lighter, to use less the power of the air conditioning. If the place is cold and the user wants to store more heat, just equip the color black.
According to the automaker, the automatic color change is activated in the microcapsules thanks to electrical impulses similar to those used in eReaders, such as Amazon’s Kindle. The difference in iX Flow, however, is that the adaptation to the body and its formats is based on algorithms.
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BMW didn’t give further details, but judging by the demonstration at CES 2022, the E Ink works only with shades of black and white. The company, however, confirmed that the technology will debut in iX Flow and will be extended to other models of the brand in the coming years.
