On January 7, 2025 (January 8 JST), CES (Consumer Electronics Show) 2025, the world’s largest technology event, opened in Las Vegas, Nevada, USA, with more than 140,000 attendees from 160 countries and regions around the world, showcasing cutting-edge technologies such as AI, semiconductors, and software-defined vehicles (SDV).

At the event, Honda unveiled two prototypes of the Honda 0 (zero) series, the Honda 0 Saloon and the Honda 0 SUV, as well as the world premiere of its unique vehicle operating system, ASIMO OS, which will be used in the series.

The Honda 0 Series is a series of electric vehicles (EVs) developed by Honda on the concept of "returning to its starting point and rethinking mobility from zero.” The development approach overturns the conventional “thick and heavy “ image of EVs, instead  “expands design possibilities and realizes high aerodynamic performance (Thin),” “realizes nimble driving and electric cost performance (Light),” and “makes the car smarter through intelligent technology (Wise).”

Honda, which introduced production technologies that embody “Thin” and “Light” at the Honda 0 Tech Meeting 2024 last October, focused on “Wise” in its presentation at CES 2025. “Wise” refers to the experience value for the user provided by an intelligent vehicle thinking deeply of its user and providing ultra-personal optimization.

This issue of Honda Stories explores what Honda’s “Wise” experience value is.

●Honda 0 SALOON

Honda 0 Saloon, a prototype model designed for mass production, is a further evolution of the Saloon concept model, which made its world premiere at CES 2024 last year and attracted attention for its low height, sporty style and spacious interior.

●Honda 0 SUV

Honda 0 SUV is the first prototype model of the Honda 0 series, a mid-size SUV to be launched in various regions, starting with the North American market in the first half of 2026, followed by Japan and Europe. It inherits the concept of the Space-Hub concept model unveiled at last year’s CES 2024, offering a spacious living space with a high degree of freedom.

In Honda’s press conference at CES 2025, Katsushi Inoue (Senior Managing Executive Officer, Chief Officer, Electrification Business Development Operations ), emphasized the “Wise” aspect of the Honda 0 Series development approach "Thin, Light, and Wise.”

The name of the vehicle OS, which serves as the basic software essential to control the entire SDV, is ASIMO OS. Inoue explains why the name was chosen.

ASIMO made its first appearance at CES around 20 years ago. Since then, ASIMO evolved Honda’s robotics technologies, such as external world recognition and independent action control that acts based on human intention, which were integrated with advanced intelligence technology.

The Honda 0 Series will adopt a domain-centric E&E architecture that integrates functions in three domain Electronic Control Units (ECUs). In the next generation model, the architecture will evolve to a centralized architecture that integrates various domains, such as personal authentication, emotion and intention estimation, and scene understanding, in each domain. The software will be able to provide the user with optimized value propositions.

Specifically, by utilizing wide-ranging data obtained from cameras and sensors inside and outside the vehicle, the system will be able to understand the emotions and intentions of the occupants and suggest interior lighting and music, as well as provide information on nearby spots.

ASIMO is loved by people all over the world and has become a symbol of robotics, and we aim for the Honda 0 Series to do the same, to surprise and impress people all over the world, and to become a symbol of the next generation of EVs.

In 2021, Honda became the first company in the world to commercialize AD (automatic driving) Level 3, which enables eyes-off (eyes away from the direction of travel) movement under certain conditions.

The Honda 0 Series is based on its accumulated fundamental technologies and know-how, and the value provided by AD (Automatic Driving)/ADAS (Advanced Driver Assistance Systems) is further enhanced through unsupervised learning (a learning method in which a computer is trained without being given the correct answer and derives the regularity and characteristics of data on its own) by Helm.ai, a company that specializes in AI image recognition technology.

For example, people do not drive only by looking at the white lines and markings on the road, but also recognize the shape of the road from the surrounding buildings, trees, and even the openness of the sky.

However, since there are countless patterns of surrounding objects other than the road, it is impossible for a system to learn everything. To achieve highly reliable automated driving, a vehicle must be able to recognize and understand its surroundings, just like a person, in any driving environment and respond appropriately to unexpected events. In order to achieve this, the Honda 0 Series can, for example, efficiently learn the myriad of information on the outside world required for automated driving by uniformly recognizing trees, even though there are countless types and their appearance changes with the seasons, as “roadside trees” in an abstract manner. This enables AD to recognize and estimate external information while driving like a person, even on roads that are being driven for the first time and even when white lines are not visible.

Honda positions the value provided by the Honda 0 Series as an “ultra-personalized driving experience,” and will launch the Honda 0 SUV in the first half of 2026, followed by the Honda 0 SALOON by the end of 2026 in North America, followed by Japan and Europe.

With the Honda 0 series, we will continue to create new values that will excite people and make them want to move around more with the power of “Wise,” as I have just introduced. We look forward to your continued support.