Peugeot's Cars of the Future

Car design contests have been running amok these days and Peugeot just couldn't not join the frenzy and so, the French company recently unveiled the results of the fifth Peugeot Design Contest. Well, to be completely honest with you, the actual contest took place between August 15 and September 15; only the results were announced in October. Anyway, out of 2500 works from designers of around 100 nationalities, the jury elected by Peugeot nominated the RD concept as the winner, Ego as runner-up and OXO as third position.

The man behind the RD is Carlos Arturo Torres Tovar, a 25-year-old Colombian, now €10,000 richer, but more importantly, he will get to see his creation produced in full-scale model form for the Shanghai Motor Show in the spring of 2009. The other two winners, namely Turkey's 45-year-old Emre Yazici and China's 22-year-old Lou Ke will be nominated on Make's institutional website on October 10 and will receive their Xbox console prizes toward the end of the same month.

For those of you not familiar with Peugeot's contest, here's the original announcement made by the French company:

“Create a Concept Car which is designed to evolve within the cities of the future, whilst retaining the key values of the 21st century. The projects should bear Peugeot's stylistic codes and must contain the following four aspects included in this design competition: environmental awareness, social harmony, interactive mobility and economic efficiency.”

To make a long and pretentious paragraph short, Peugeot wanted the city car of the future with some of the features seen on today's vehicles, obviously all wrapped in the company's design style.

Tovar's winning RD concept is a small-size vehicle designed to swoosh through crowded and narrow streets with an extremely sci-fi feature: folding. Yes, you heard that right, this yet-virtual contraption can actually shorten its length by folding. Unfortunately, we are unable to provide more information on the RD, because Mr. Tovar chose to present his information on Peugeot's site in Spanish.

Moving on to the second place, Emre Yazici says the EGO “has been conceived as a lean vehicle in every aspect. It is easy to own, easy to maintain, and easy to operate. And, most importantly, it is easy on the environment. The majority of the vehicles at the rush-hour in a big city, carry a single passenger. EGO is designed for a single passenger. Its overall weight, which is close to the quarter of the weight of an economy class four-door sedan, makes the electrical-only propulsion feasible”. Another major feature touted by Mr. Yazici is the immunity to weather changes (whatever that means). Last, but not least is the unique steering, which uses variable wheel rotation, allowing the EGO to make G-turns.

As for Lou Ke's OXO, well, we hate to say it, but we didn't understand much of the description provided. Perhaps you can make more of it. Here it is.

“I don't think this type belonged "20?" "30?" or "90?",so i give the name "x0x",but the car shape is more like "oxo",so it is. A electric power car.

The car looks like a toy,because the color is no stress just like tomorrow life,naive and freedom.

Then you must drive a car with out learning how to drive it. The "oxo" is one of this type.

Drive the car is easy than in games,with the "PEUGEOT Phone" help,the car can be controled or autorun. The "X" system inside is save the space when the car parking,and through narrow or crowded street. The car wheel allowed the car lateral movement,rotate in-situ,and so on..

With the nimble and smart friend help,you must have a perfect tomorrow.”

Check out more images in the gallery posted below.