Listening to some tunes while driving is great if you're on your own, but if you have passengers with varied tastes then pleasing everyone can be a problem. We've seen the likes of Harman and Hyundai-Kia envelop individuals in their own audio bubbles, but the dynamic focused sound system being tested by car maker Seat at the moment promises to wirelessly deliver sound direct to a driver or passenger's ears.
Israel's Noveto launched its My Virtual Headphones technology at CES 2018, where sensors track a listener's head movement, source audio is sent through Noveto's processing and digital signal processing engines and transducers wirelessly focus sound directly to the music lover's ears.
Now the company has signed up with Seat to demonstrate that the technology can be successfully integrated into the car maker's vehicles, aiming to allow kids in the back to each listen to their own favorites, while the driver can hear navigation instructions or a personal playlist while the front passenger gets engrossed in a podcast or audio book. All oblivious to each other's audio streams.
Few details on how the system actually works have been revealed, but we're no strangers to targeted audio – having previously followed the progress Richard Haberkern's Soundlazer technology from parametric pocket speaker to and overhead planar wave system. The Noveto dynamic focused sound system adds user tracking to the mix and promises high quality audio for each listener.
"Applying this new technology will enable us to open a world of possibilities for privately owned vehicles, and especially for shared vehicles," said Seat's Fabian Simmer. "Being able to share your car and maintain your privacy is certainly a challenge that seems increasingly achievable, with solutions like the one proposed by Noveto which we hope to feature in our vehicles."
Source: Seat
