Hankook Tire Co. hosted a “Design Insight Forum” at Hankook Technodome to help cultivate future leaders and unveil “Best of the Best” new cutting-edge concepts of “Design Innovation 2016.”
“The Design Insight Forum” has been hosted every year since 2004. This year, the forum covers not only tire-centered smart mobility in the future mega cities under the theme of “Connect to the Connected World,” but also the latest auto-tech trend regarding fast-changing automotive market and tire technology for future electric vehicle.
“The Design Insight Forum to be held at Hankook Technodome is truly meaningful that one can witness fine works of young designers of the future tire innovation at the new and state-of-the art R&D center, Hankook Technodome,” said Seung Hwa Suh, vice chairman and CEO of Hankook Tire. “Hankook Tire expects to create further synergies with the future leaders in collaboration with Hankook Tire’s technology leadership through the Design Insight Forum.”
Hankook sponsors the Design Innovation in which the tiremaker collaborates with design universities’ students. This year, the program was executed in collaboration with senior industrial design students from the University of Cincinnati to suggest mobility in the future mega cities in the forms of self-driving and connected cars, and car-sharing.
A total of 34 works were submitted as the result of Design Innovation 2016. Among them, the five winning works included “Flexup,” moving freely even in stairs; “Magfloat,” driving with a flexible wheel by using magnetic field; “Autobine,” adding the tires with expandable bus body depending on the number of passengers; “Shiftrac,” having powerful cornering by using skating principle; and “i-Play,” maximizing cornering performance. These designs were selected to be exhibited in mock-ups and animation at the Hankook Technodome.
