Five clever bags that will help you travel smarter. From charging your devices to telling you what you should be packing these luggage options do it all.
With technology improving in leaps and bounds rather than baby steps, tech mavericks are making our world ‘smarter’. There’s an onslaught of new smart luggage that could significantly improve our travel – these bags will do more than carry your underwear through international borders.
5. Kinetic Energy Case
Others have done the whole ‘bag that charges your phone’ trick but not one as green as this bag. This case generates kinetic energy as the wheels turn that then juices up your electronic devices. Very clever idea that also looks cool as hell, this concept bag looks like a concept car from Tron.
4. Briggs & Riley Cases – CX Compression Packing
Here’s one that I love the idea of. Briggs & Riley’s cases expand up to 33% to fit all your belongings in and then squishes all the air out of your clothes to compress the case back down to original size – think about those vacuum bags you use to store all the blankets/coats over summer. You can pack more, compress to save space and arrive wrinkle free.
3. Hop
Hands free is all the rage, so why isn’t there such a thing as hands free luggage, well there is. Enter the Hop, a robotic self driving suitcase that follows its owner around from a short distance via Bluetooth signal. If the signal is lose, the bag stops and locks itself, then alerts it’s owners via a phone vibrate.
2. Airbus ‘Bag2Go’
Airbus, known for aircraft like the A380 superjumbo and the A350 jetliner, they’re no stranger to innovation in the travel industry. They’ve now focused their attentions from the best way to carry passengers to the best bags for passengers to carry. Their prototype ‘smart’ bag comes with a companion iPhone app and a ‘find my bag’ function to track your lost luggage. It also includes an RFID chip that lets the bag work with the automated baggage-handling systems that can match your bag with your itinerary and frequent flyer number. Want to know how much your bag weighs? Simply lift the bag and read out the weight on your iPhone. This is still in early development so stay tuned.
1. Bluesmart
What can’t this bag do, my personal favourite, the Bluesmart is approved by all airlines to carry on and weighs only 3.8kg. It connects to your phone via Bluetooth and allows you to lock, unlock, weigh, locate and track your suitcase. What else do you need? There’s also a built in battery charger that can be used to fully charge devices six times over, it updates you on your flights current status, tells you what the weather is at your destination and even suggests what you’d need to pack. The app will even tell you more about your travel habits like miles travelled, airports visited and time spent in each country.
BONUS: The City Cab
One I wouldn’t purchase myself, but definitely hilarious. The City Cab is a motorized suitcase that doubles as a scooter. It’s got a steering grip, brakes, safety lights, a horn, a GPS device and a theft alarm, carries up to two passengers and can travel at about 20 kilometres per hour for about 60km. It only weighs 7kg. That’s one way to ensure you won’t miss your flight during your next layover.