What does a guy do when his fiance gets into an accident while driving and talking on her phone? Well, he builds a product which helps to stop that from happening. Thus, Exploride was born. In the world where Big companies like Google and Apple are making products like Android Auto and Apple CarPlay, a startup from an unknown village in Kochi raising over half a million in funding ought to raise some eyebrows.
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=id7OmL3T7T4]
Concept
The idea behind Exploride is not entirely new, but the implementation certainly is. Exploride is a head-up display which sits on the top of the dashboard of your car and turns it into a smart car. It allows you to access music, get direction on your maps, attend to calls, text and much more just by using intuitive gesture and hands-free voice control. The display is transparent and hence reduce distraction and helps you concentrate on the road.
Exploride has a built-in GPS and supports LTE. It has custom Google Maps and the ability to take your maps offline if the need arises. It supports voice-activated navigation. For you social media buffs out there, It has inbuilt apps to manage your Facebook and Twitter accounts. You will never miss a notification again. It also comes with onboard diagnostics. The display will show information like tire pressure, speed, fuel status etc.
We like the idea and the concept behind the product. The implementation of the idea is novel and unique. More importantly it is trying to solve a big problem in today’s world and aims at helping our drivers ride safe.
Design/Usability
As mentioned the transparent head up display sits on the top of your car’s dashboard. You interact with it using a variety of intuitive hand gestures and voice controls. All the information comes up on the display and you can interact or discard it using gestures. It gives you turn by turn direction and read your messages out loud so you don’t have to take your eyes off the road. You can control your music on the phone or you can connect it to your Spotify or any other cloud-based music streaming services.
You can install Exploride in any car. It is universally compatible with any size of Dashboard. It has a semi-adhesive mat which helps to place it firmly. Also, it is portable and lightweight so you can switch it between cars of you own more than one.
We can not predict its usability in India presently, but it has a bright future. As the country gets better LTE connectivity and people get more aware about the product, we think it has a potential to create a big market for itself here.
Specification
- 6-inch transparent screen
- A quad-core processor
- 2GB of RAM
- 16GB of internal memory
- IR sensor
- Inbuilt microphones
- Dual output mini speakers
- OBD II Adaptor
- 5MP camera sensor
Game Changer?
It’s too early to comment. The product is yet to launch and face real world usage and stiff customer reviews. But from what we have seen till now and the level of faith people has shown towards the product we can hope it rises to the level of our expectation. Being a crowd-funded product where people help raise over half a million USD, it has lots more to do to become a game changer.
Launch, Availability, and Expected Price
Exploride is up for pre-orders now on Indiegogo and expected delivery date is January 2016. It has already received 1800 pre-orders from around 50 countries. It starts at $299 for the base model and goes up to $339 for the Limited Edition RED model.
