Evos – Ford Unveils a Beautiful New Hybrid Electric Concept

Today Ford unveiled the brand new Evos concept car in Berlin, Germany, and Cali Lewis and I were fortunate enough to be there for the unveiling of this jaw-droppingly beautiful model of modern technology.

The new Ford Evos concept is similar to the Chevy Volt in that both are electric hybrids. Each of these vehicles can drive around for up to 50 miles using nothing but electric power, and each can also motivate themselves down the road using their traditional gasoline engines.

Of course, one major difference is that you can actually go out and purchase a Chevy Volt right now, while the Evos is still just a concept. That being said, Ford is promising that we’ll begin to see elements of the Evos present in vehicles starting as early as next year.

Ford Evos Design Elements

Like other concept cars, the Evos is the embodiment of the dreams of a team of talented designers. It’s absolutely loaded with all of the latest lust-inducing technology, and it has a body that just won’t quit. If Ford could package up the Evos and roll it out the door to showrooms today, at even a moderately reasonable price, I’m sure they would sell out immediately.

Ford says the new Evos concept serves as a model for a number of design elements that we’ll see across a wide range of Ford nameplates in the years to come. After the unveiling today Cali caught up with J. Mays, Fords Head of Design, and we’ll get that video up in the next day or so. In the meantime here are a few observations:

• The most immediately striking thing about the Evos are the 4 gull-wing doors. Although they are the most beautiful part of the concept, sadly I doubt we’ll ever see anything like these in a production vehicle.
• A sporty new 4 seater profile was imagined for the Evos, which has the sort of raw sex appeal that makes you want to just get in and drive the car. Everyone I talked to who saw the Evos immediately loved it – which is an impressive feat considering that individual taste in cars varies wildly!
• Super thin slit LED lights occupy a much smaller section of the faceplate, leaving more room for wind-tunnel friendly bumper sculpting, and looking extremely high-tech.
• A single center-mounted exhaust at the rear is reminiscent of the Porsche Boxster, or several other purebred sports cars, conjuring up images of performance.
• The Evos’ non-traditional sunroof design stretches down the center of the cabin and ultimately blends into the rear window, giving back seat passengers the ability to look up as well as those in the front seat.

Which of these elements get baked into new designs is anyone’s guess, but I’d wager a bet that the new grill, thin LED headlights, the full length sunroom, and swooping wind-tunnel friendly body designs are here to stay.

Ford Evos Technology Re-Imagined

I had dinner with Paul Mascarenas, Ford’s Chief Technology Officer and Vice President of Research and Advanced Engineering, and we discussed many of the design and technology elements present in the new Evos concept. Today, after the official unveiling I also caught up with him and we did a quick video interview, which I will also have uploaded within the next day or two. So keep an eye out for that.

Meanwhile, a few of the technology concepts Ford imagines:

• Ford imagines a day when they operate a data cloud which stores your personal information, preferences, tasks and more, and helps keep you organized.
• Not only does the cloud organize data, but it can help you with scheduling. For example, imagine Ford checking your Google calendar and seeing that you have an early meeting with a colleague. So you set your alarm clock to get up early. The Ford cloud sees that your meeting partner has cancelled during the night, so the system re-sets your clock to give you an extra hour of sleep!
• The Ford technology platform is also envisioned to provide a ton of vehicle tuning and customization to fit your driving preferences, even based on road conditions. For example, I’m a real driving enthusiast, so my car might suggest an alternate route that people in my social network have indicated is a great “drivers road”. When I start getting agressive, the car can firm up the suspension, mute my phone calls to minimize driver distraction, and even monitor my heart rate to see if I’m getting a little too excited.
• Another unique concept that Ford has thrown out would be to place large induction charging mats in garages, where the Evos (or it’s derivatives) could park on a giant charging mat and power up without needing a physical plug. Kind of like most electric toothbrushes nowadays – only much, much bigger.

Ford Evos Concept Car Photos

What good is talking about a beautiful concept car? After all, pictures are worth 1,000 words! So here are about 70,000 words worth of pics to drool over! All of these were taken at today’s unveiling. Some, just for fun. Most, of the Evos Concept Car (red one) and its model (the yellow one).

As always, click on any image to see a larger version, and keep clicking to get to the biggest one.

So, what do you think? Is this thing magnificent, or what?