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Volvo EX90 SUV will have interior radar system to detect kids, pets

Volvo has introduced a number of important safety features in its vehicles throughout the years including the first three-point seatbelt back in 1959. But now the company has developed something a bit more techy with what it's calling the world's first interior radar system for cars.  Set to debut on its upcoming flagship EX90 electric SUV, Volvo's new radar system is designed to monitor both the cabin and trunk of a vehicle in order to prevent the car from being locked while anyone is still inside. The idea is to guard against situations where pets or children may be inadvertently trapped inside a car on a hot day, with the car surfacing reminders if it recognizes that there are still occupants inside when being locked. Additionally, the car's climate control can also be set to stay on if a passenger is detected, further lowering the risk of heatstroke.  While the thought of leaving a pet or child inside a car on a hot day is unimaginable to most people, it can happen to anyone. In its press release, Volvo cited statistics from the U.S. where more than 900 children have tragically died due to hyperthermia since 1998.  Volvo's senior technical specialist for injury prevention Lotta Jakobsson says, “No one chooses to be distracted or tired, but we know it can happen. WeÂ’re all human and distraction is a fact of life. With the help of cutting edge technology, weÂ’ll support you when youÂ’re not at your best and help you avoid leaving family members or pets behind by accident.” In order to cover as much of the inside of the EX90 as possible, Volvo says it will use multiple radars positioned in the car's overhead console, roof-mounted reading lamps and in the trunk that can detect "sub-millimeter" movements. Unfortunately, we won't get a more detailed idea of how Volvo's new interior radar system really works until the EX90 is officially revealed on November 9th. But given that the new feature will come standard on the company's forthcoming EV (where allowed by regulation), we're hoping to see similar systems become basic equipment on more cars and makes in the future. 

Geely targeting US market in 2016 with help from Volvo

Following reports that it'd team up with corporate sibling Volvo on a Chinese-market car comes a report from Bloomberg that Geely would reattempt its entry into the US market. The Chinese brand had a display at the 2006 North American International Auto Show, but has been absent from the US scene ever since.
The Geely branded cars will be jointly developed with Volvo, and bank on the Swedish manufacturers reputation for safety and reliability. Geely's CEO, Gui Shengyue, explained, "Our acquisition of Volvo enhanced our image and overseas consumers are seeing us as an international company." This represents a change in rhetoric for the brand, after Geely Chairman Li Shufu hamstrung the idea of a closer pairing, citing fears that an association would harm Volvo's reputation. The news of projects between Geely and Volvo first broke last week, although it's unclear if the cars that end up coming to the US will be the same as those being sold in China.
As we reported last week, Geely is already aiming to be the biggest brand in the Chinese domestic market. With this move to the US market, it's also attempting to overtake Chery as China's largest automotive exporter. According to the Bloomberg report, Geely has already moved 180,000 units overseas, which is extremely close to the 184,800 vehicles sold by Chery in 2012. By 2018, Geely anticipates that 60 percent of its sales will be occur outside of the PRC.

Volvo's plan for China: sell them on the clean air inside the car

Large Chinese cities aren't known for having clean air. Just this week, the Chinese city of Harbin filled with record levels of smog after starting the city's coal-fired heating system, according to CNN. But Li Shufu, the chairman of Geely, Volvo's parent company, says the automaker's astute attention to cabin comfort in areas such as air filtration is a selling point for the Swedish automaker in China, Forbes reports.
Shufu says when he is inside a Volvo, he feels like he's in Northern Europe, but when the door is opened, he feels like he's in Beijing. The chairman made the remarks at the fourth annual Global Auto Forum (GAF) in China (which also happened to be attended by Alan Mulally, CEO of Ford, which was Volvo's owner until 2010), where he emphasized Geely's hands-off approach to managing Volvo, saying, "Geely and Volvo are brothers, not father and son."
While good filtration contributes to cabin comfort, the way we see it, Shufu also is allowing Volvo to play to its most well-known strength: safety. Smog protection via air filtration might not seem like the most important safety feature for a car in the US (unless you live in Los Angeles), but when you consider that Harbin's level of fine particles was up to 30 times higher than the World Health Organization's recommended standard on Tuesday, we'd think twice about that. Fine particles, which are 2.5 micrometers in diameter or less, are considered to be the most harmful to health.