Hyundai's TIGER Concept is a Walking, Climbing Autonomous Vehicle

Hyundai has unveiled a new autonomous robot under its Transforming Intelligent Ground Excursion Robot (TIGER) program, designed to handle extreme conditions through its innovative four-legged configuration.

The design of the TIGER X-1 is based on an earlier, much larger concept unveiled at CES 2019 named the Elevate, which was designed to carry passengers and be driven by a person. Unlike its predecessor, however, the X-1 is roughly just the size of a house pet, and focuses more on surveillance missions or carrying and delivering equipment and supplies for scientific researchers in treacherous terrains through its autonomous capabilities. By unfolding its fully-articulated legs and locking each of its wheels individually, the X-1 can walk, climb, and hop over harsher environments and surfaces which its normal all-wheel-drive mode wouldn’t have allowed it to traverse.

“Vehicles like TIGER, and the technologies underpinning it, give us an opportunity to push our imaginations,” said Dr. John Suh, the lead at Hyundai’s New Horizons Studio. “We are constantly looking at ways to rethink vehicle design and development and re-define the future of transportation and mobility.”

“There’s a lot of technical obstacles that we need to overcome so it has the flavor of a science project,” he added. “But our great desire is to make it a product. One day, for sure.”

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