With the ever-rising awareness of personal health, wellness, and a growing ride-sharing economy, vehicle interiors will increasingly become a public space. Yanfeng’s Wellness Pod console features a touchpad interface with user-friendly smartphone app control. The slim console with its concealed air vents can be seamlessly integrated into the cabin interior. It can be mounted as an overhead console or be designed as a portable unit for multimodal transportation including train cabins, boats, buses, or vans, in line with customer specifications. The Wellness Pod, with built-in lens technology for UV distribution, integrates the features and functions of UV Air Sanitizer, Multi-Scent Dispensing, and UV Surface Sanitizer.

“We’ve developed the Wellness Pod to provide passengers with the most comfortable travelling experience, taking all senses into consideration,” explains Han Hendriks, Chief Technology Officer at Yanfeng Technology. “Most people do care a lot about the cleanliness of their own or shared cars, and people care about a wholesome, healthy, and appealing interior of the cabin when starting their journeys. Our Wellness Pod meets these demands with unmatched hygiene functionality and consumer choices. But it is also equally important for shared mobility service companies as a clean and fresh interior drives customer satisfaction and vehicle up-time, both are essential to this business model.”

UV Air Sanitizer and Surface Sanitizer improve in-car hygiene

The UV Sanitizer technology is an antimicrobial device that sanitizes interior surfaces and air with UV-C light, destroying both bacteria and viruses to ensure a healthy environment for all passengers. The UV Air Sanitizer efficiently uses the same UV light source as the Surface Sanitizer. Air circulation is based on redirected HVAC airflow.

Directly exposed surfaces experience up to 99.9% reduction in bacteria through the UV Surface Sanitizer, while even indirect surfaces show a 95% reduction. A quick-clean mode between rides ensures continuous cleanliness of high-touch zones for ride-share providers. The sensor technology in the vehicle effectively detects what spots have been touched and where cleaning is required. Full cabin air and surface sanitation would take around 30 minutes and is applied in standstill periods when the car is not occupied.

Smart Multi-Scent Dispenser enhances passenger’s experience through custom fragrance delivery

Yanfeng offers its passengers the choice to experience a ride that leverages all of our senses, including our sense of smell. The intelligent, cloud-based solution for diffusing scent is the world’s first connected platform for scent based on Inhalio technology. With this technology, OEM customers can customize fragrances for their vehicles and products. Ordering and installing the replaceable cartridges can be done through a smartphone app that Yanfeng can offer through its most recent startup partner Inhalió. Over time, a growing number of scents for wellbeing will be made available, to match consumer preferences. Initially, the standard configuration of the Wellness Pod offers four different scent cartridges, with fragrances that can be individually selected. In addition to wellness scents which are aimed at private car owners, several scents also offer functional benefits. These go beyond a pleasing smell in the vehicle and have the ability to mitigate motion sickness and enhance general wellbeing, provide a calming effect during stressful driving situations, and even increase alertness and attention.

Scent dispenser can mitigate motion sickness

Identifying solutions to mitigate travel nausea is gaining momentum due to the onset of vehicles that drive themselves and in rideshare situations. When passengers can comfortably rotate their seats to face backward and have a conversation or a business meeting, they are more susceptible to feeling sick from the vehicle’s movements. Through the scent dispenser this can be inhibited, even before travel sickness takes hold, making the ride more comfortable for the passengers.

“Our Intelligent Scent 3.0 technology does not use any spray or oil-based fragrances, as is common in cars to date. Non-liquid, scent impregnated polymers release their fragrance through a dry-air distribution system and natural airflow within the vehicle’s interior, completely free of alcohol, VOCs, or allergens”, said Keith Kelsen, CEO of Inhalió. Therefore, no oily surfaces and air-releases do not require cleaning.

“As the olfactory memory of humans is even more precise than our visual memory, this unique evolution of a scent experience will have a lasting impact on our riding experience. The odor endurance time of the fragrance is very short, so it is not overbearing. The residual smell stays in the brain, but doesn’t linger in the interior,” Han Hendriks added.

Artificial intelligence-based firmware collects data on preference, frequency of use and when the fragrance cartridges need to be changed. Controlled via the operating system of the vehicle or an app, the system will then be able to make informed purchase suggestions for new scents to passengers.
The strategic partnership with Inhalió was initiated through Yanfeng’s close relationship with startup platform Plug and Play in Sunnyvale, California — a contact that was first initiated in the spring of 2018.