As the conversation about autonomous cars heats up, BMW is looking at a different way to make use of cloud technology to power how their vehicles operate. Their focus? Owning the customer experience and making it fit the rest of the driving experience. Instead of outsourcing infotainment to another company, BMW has decided to keep it in-house while accommodating Apple CarPlay integration. BMW's target market is decidedly tech-savvy, and by tapping into this attribute they have the upper hand on making a product that fits all aspects of a customer's lifestyle compared to the oft-panned infotainment systems in competing products.
BMW has taken a step towards this seamless integration by acquiring Nokia's Chicago software team and its experience in mobile, cloud, and internet services. One of the biggest barriers to applying this expertise to in-vehicle software thus far has been the disparity in cycles: tech updates every two years or so while vehicle generations stick around up to three times longer. And, because of tech cycles, vehicle software is nearly always out of date, even when the vehicle is brand new. The other trouble is that even the newest infotainment system is outdated quickly, and there is no way to offer system updates so old technology is on the road long past its relevance.
Many manufacturers are working around this by adopting Apple CarPlay and Android Auto integration into their infotainment systems. This moves the burden of current tech to the owners' smartphones, which are nearly always online and able to receive updates. Smartphone integration then handles the majority of audio, navigation, and message notifications, and less tech reliant systems such as climate control or setting personalization are handled in other menus or by physical switchgear. However, to address this challenge effectively BMW felt that the answers were in the cloud instead of a third party's product. Though BMW has integrated Apple CarPlay it has done so reluctantly and has forgone Android Auto completely.
Here is where Microsoft enters the tech picture - BMW is working with them and other companies to customize their cloud products for in-vehicle use and is heavily utilizing the Microsoft Azure Cloud platform to see it through. Now, you can receive Outlook notifications in your BMW and support for Skype is coming soon. However, BMW is always striving for a premium product and here is no exception - you'll never see a Microsoft logo. BMW insists on retaining complete control over how the user interacts with the system and how they see it. Currently, they are working on a solution for the Siri/OK Google problem as those popular personal assistants are well-loved by their users but do not fit into the premium schematic. With cloud integration comes other benefits - now engineers can see how the software is used in real life and push updates to fine tune the experience or resolve bugs. So far this year 260 updates have been pushed out, compared to the 0 that have made it to many other brands' infotainment systems.
Sure, BMW is taking ownership of the customer experience but it's not just doing it so that you can get a reminder about that 3pm meeting without looking at your phone, it's doing it to ready the platform for fully autonomous vehicles in the future. When drivers suddenly turn into riders there is a vastly untapped productivity market and BMW wants to be the first on scene. By taking the steps now to set them apart later, BMW hopes to solidify its market share as vehicle manufacturers transition to software developers too.
This article was based on a July 30, 2017 TechCrunch article by Frederic Lardinois. Read it here.