The AMSAS works at speeds of up to 5mph, where bikes are much less vertically stable, and Jun Sakamoto, Yamaha’s head of safety strategy, explained its importance: “It’s to create conditions where the rider can focus more on operating their bike, so that everyone can enjoy that sense of being one with your machine. By providing an assist when the bike is more unstable and requires skill to operate, we want to deliver fun rooted in peace of mind to a wide range of riders.”
Yamaha has been one of the key players in self-balancing machinery, setting a goal to reduce the number of fatal motorcycle accidents to zero by 2050. Yamaha also pointed out that 70% of all motorcycle accidents happen within two seconds of the initial cause, which it claims is not enough time for some riders to be able to react accordingly, which is where AMSAS can provide potentially life-saving assistance.
Its first foray into the technology came in 2015 in the shape of the Motobot, which was then superseded by the Motodroid two years later, both of which were robotic systems capable of riding bikes without human intervention. The latter was even said to have been capable of lapping circuits faster than MotoGP legend Valentino Rossi.