Digital owner’s manuals are pretty common these days, but how many augmented reality ones you can list? Difficult question, isn’t it? In few time the answer will be easier to give thanks to the South Korean automotive company Hyundai, that soon will be the first releasing a tool like this.
The company’s project is to release in 2015 the app Hyundai Virtual Guide, technologic version of the classic paper owner’s manual that, through a smartphone or a tablet and augmented reality, will let the drivers learn more on features, maintenance and repairs of their vehicle.
For the creation of this app, Hyundai followed the answers that their clients gave to some surveys to determine which parts and features on a vehicle were most confusing or difficult to understand and built the app around them; inside Virtual Guide there will be also 82 how-to videos, six 3D overlay images that appear once users scan areas of their vehicle like the engine bay and more than 50 informational guides.
Among these, the app will be able to identify and provide information about the air filter, smart cruise control, Bluetooth phone pairing, warning indicators, clock, engine oil, brake fluid, fuse box and smart trunk.
“The Virtual Guide is aimed at educating our owners on how to use the functions and features of their vehicle,” said Frank Ferrara, executive vice president, customer satisfaction, Hyundai Motor America. “We modernized the idea of an owner’s manual to provide the highest-quality user experience for the growing population of tech savvy consumers.”
Hyundai Virtual Guide will be at first compatible with Hyundai Sonata 2015, recognizing more than 45 major features of this model, but it will cover other vehicles in the future.