His theory comes after Toyota unveiled his e-Palette autonomous delivery vehicle, talking to press last week at Toyota’s Nagoya office in Japan.
“Toyota said it’s going to be a mobility provider, and that doesn’t necessarily mean four wheels,” he explains to Fortune.
“The boundaries between car makers, train makers, bicycle makers and whatever else are going to change. You need to go into it with an open mind.”
When quizzed about how the danger of mobility becoming commoditised for the likes of Toyota, Humphries says “delivering cargo and mass transit at the same time, that’s a big mindset change”.
He says contrary to some doubters, driving enthusiasts could benefit most from the division.
“When the majority of your transport needs are fulfilled by something like e-Palette, then the other side of it is you can buy a sports car that really is a sports car,” he says.
“A lot of the people who really like cars are worried about the future, but I see it the other way round.”
“If we end up with some kind of optimized transportation system, the cars that people purchase for themselves are going to be much more specific,” he adds.
Citing Sony and Apple as two of his design inspirations, Humphries says the radically different future he describes is hard to pinpoint the arrival of.
“Design I always admired was Sony in the late eighties and early nineties,” he divulges.
“They were completely focused on what they thought was best.”
He describes Apple as having “this unreachable goal that they’re always going to chase.”
“At the moment, everything in a car from a design point of view is based on a 100-year-old package — engine in the front, and a driver holding a steering wheel behind. When you don’t have to hold a steering wheel, the world is your oyster,” he says.
“Everything is starting to happen more quickly than people expected two or three years ago. I would say we’ve passed the tipping point. And now it’s a race.”
