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“AC” in AC Future stands for Amy and Cindy, the two daughters of founder Arthur Qin. That was just one of the pieces of information I got on the company CES event where we got the first look at the new AC Future Ai-TH transformable house. This is more other nattily appointed answer to the housing crisis we see on the 2025 show floor. It comes in three models: a deliverable pod (Ai-Thu), a pullable trailer (Ai-THt) and a road-ready EV RV (Ai-THd). Press and prospective buyers got to tour the EV prototype this week (but we had to take our shoes off first).
Thanks to pull-out sections in the back and on both sides, the bus-sized RV becomes a 400-square-foot, one-bed, one-bath apartment, complete with living room, kitchen with full-sized refrigerator, two burner induction range and microwave, along with an uncramped stall shower and washer/dryer in the bathroom. A full HVAC system, paired with high-efficiency insulation keeps the unit temperate.
All that amounts to one heck of a power draw, which AC Future addresses with a roof covered in solar panels. I was told that all three Ai-TH models generate about 25 kWh of energy a day. For reference, the average American home uses about 30 kWh per day. The house can also be plugged in if there is not enough sunlight, and there are mentioned wind generation options for customers in cloudy climates.
All Ai-TH models also come with atmospheric water generation that can absorb between 13 and 15 gallons of water per day from thin air. That’s less than the 200 or so gallons that American homes use for non-landscaping needs, so Ai-TH also recycles gray water and, of course, has a tank that hold. In theory, these units could act as fully self-sustaining living pods, gathering what is needed from the world around them.
Because this is CES 2025, where the unofficial model is “Stick some AI in it!” There is a whole house proprietary AI assistant called Futura to turn on your lights, manage your resources and manage other management tasks. There was even a demo set up outside the RV that allowed people to “meet” “him.”
At last year’s CES, AC Future, barely two years old at the time, presented the idea for Ai-TH. The fully functional prototype we saw was built in collaboration with Hydra, an automotive design and prototyping studio from Southern California. Models going into production will have components sourced from multiple suppliers; I’m told there are three partners lined up for EV motors alone.
AC Future says it is “focused on solving the affordable, sustainable and mobile housing crisis around the world.” And any talk of solving the housing crisis must include some discussion of price, unless we rely on some trickle-down economy-style solutions. The static base model starts at $98,000, the trailer model goes for $138,000 and up and the drivable version starts at $298,000.
AC Future’s COO told me that production will start as soon as they leave Vegas (the whole team is at CES) and reservations are now open.
