Palexpo, Geneva - The motor show is in full swing, but with car companies slowly opening up their vehicles to digital developers, could future shows see an app being the star attraction?
Ola Henfridsson, professor of information systems and management at Warwick Business School, believes it is only a question of time before the traditional car industry is sidelined by app developers as technology firms such as Google and Microsoft muscle in on the sector.
Henfridsson has spent the past eight years consulting and researching digital innovation at GM, Volvo and Saab and he is sure the open-platform car is coming.
“If you can develop an Android community with so many useful apps, think what could happen with cars,” he said. “Much of the value of today’s cars and the cost of developing them is related to the digital technology. When it comes to lowering fuel consumption or new safety features it is very much about the digital infrastructure.
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He said competition within the car industry was locked into the boundaries of the car manufacturers, but suddenly there were non-automotive companies taking parts of the markets, such as Google with the driverless car it is developing. Companies such as Google “are imagining a future where a car communicates with its environment, where what will be important in a car’s functionality is not something that GM or Volkswagen can deliver”.
“We are seeing semi-open platforms for infotainment, but we were looking at the engine management system and other digital systems in the car.”
With their ability to pair with smartphones, modern cars are already becoming mobile internet portals, but the future could bring apps that could tune your engine.
This could negate the need for costly recalls to adjust the steering or throttle - which are mostly electronic nowadays. Automakers could just send out a digital system update. Such digital repairs could financially hurt car dealerships, but a concern for auto makers is that if they don’t do it, somebody such as Google or Apple could build an open-platform car, which could transform the industry and potentially kill off some of the big manufacturers.
Star Motoring