Comment & Analysis
Until recently, the car has represented a remote island with little or no access to social media or online applications, but this is changing as smart devices become more integrated with the car’s entertainment and navigation systems.
As these trends grow, automotive OEMs are now faced with similar challenges that the consumer electronics industry has faced over the last decade. These include: whether a common industry software platform will evolve, whether software will feature more prominently than the actual hardware; how will safety concerns be met and will a related business model that supports such new value-added services for the consumer emerge as a new industry standard?
The connected car industry is still in its early stages and for now many of these questions remain open. Nonetheless, electronic services within the vehicle are fast becoming a key competitive differentiator for manufacturers. Their contribution to the value of the car is growing. It is estimated that automotive infotainment systems will constitute 40% of the total value of a car by 2025, up from 20% currently.
However, the automotive industry does not have the flexibility or luxury of beta testing or constantly tweaking their product based on real-time “trial and error” from customer feedback. The stringent quality that the industry expects of new vehicles means a launch cycle of three-five years, which makes it difficult to predict if consumer technology demands will have changed when the vehicle is launched.
Engineers also need to accommodate differing end user needs across different markets. For example, in western markets, there is more focus on back-end systems that integrate vehicle diagnostics and the health and awareness of the driver.
But in emerging markets there is more focus on front-end tech such as voice recognition.
Interestingly, the emerging manufacturers in regional markets are evolving faster than their Western counterparts. For example, two out of five Indian Automotive OEMs now opt to leverage smart phones and other connected devices, as opposed to CD players.
Delivering the Right Solutions at the Right Point
Considering these challenges, there are a number of steps that the automotive industry can adopt to ensure that the right solutions are delivered at the right time. A common software platform across OEMs may well ensure an ecosystem which will allow multiple applications to support the wider industry and meet time-to-market requirements. Consolidation and aggregation is the key to building scale.
Learning from the broader consumer electronics industry, we must have user experience at the core of product evolution. Only an intuitive user experience that makes the most of multiple input options - touch, gesture and voice - can ensure that the user has unlimited access to content whilst allaying safety concerns.
OEMs are currently using Smartphone connectivity as a quick-fix to overcome concerns on technological obsolescence. Perhaps a better way of addressing this challenge could be to build a scalable solution that can be continuously upgraded throughout the vehicle’s lifecycle, encouraging a longer and more engaging relationship between manufacturer and customer.
Connected Vehicles
We are moving into an exciting time for those designing the cars of tomorrow, to meet the challenges of new technological innovations and the diverse needs of developed and emerging markets.
There is no doubt that being able to extract some of the “unknown” by leveraging custom made embedded system solutions, standalone reusable modules, components and systems integration will not hinder innovation, but actively accelerate it. This is an approach that we ourselves are adopting with a strategy that provides an end- to-end service, which moves away from the traditional distribution of bringing standalone products to market. The 'connected vehicle' concept allows users to leverage phone apps such as navigation through the car and in future will add cloud services, with an integrated app store, voice recognition and text to speech.
We're on the cusp of big advancements in vehicle technology; harnessing these through partnerships will help to ease the transition for OEMs to this new era of connected cars.