To See How Autonomous Vehicles May Take Over, Dean Kamen Says Look What Happened In Airplanes

Dean Kamen started one transportation revolution when he invented the Segway Human Transporter, the first self-balancing, electric-powered transportation machine. So his views on the next transportation revolution, autonomous vehicles, are germane. And for the future of AVs, the industry that produces them and the consumers who ride in them, Kamen points to a previous paradigm shift in how we get around: airplanes. As founder of DEKA Research and one of the world's foremost inventors and engineering innovators, Manchester, N.H.-based Kamen became famous not just for Segway, which he introduced in 2001, but also for creations including the IBOT Mobility Device -- a sort of wheelchair-cum-Transformers -- a portable dialysis machine, a vascular stent and many more. His current focus is on bioengineering marvels such as an advanced prosthetic arm for returning injured shoulders.