Soon every car will feel like driving a smartphone
With every new model of most vehicle brands, the integration of digital tools and capabilities goes one step further into the future
ý Almost every consumer has experienced the digital revolution in their hands and pockets as mobile phones gain new capability and capacity, seemingly, every day. It’s a noisy revolution, with every new feature and function trumpeted by every cellphone manufacturer as if the wheel had just been reinvented – again and again.
Ironically, it is now indeed the turn of the wheel to undergo the same digital revolution. With every new model of most vehicle brands, the integration of digital tools and capabilities goes one step further.
As with smartphone users, motorists will experience the revolution incrementally, barely noticing that their in-vehicle experience is being transformed, so to speak, on-the-go. While hi-tech features like lane-assist and collision warnings are now standard in most high-end vehicles, these will take time to filter down to mass-market cars.
However, the digital functionality of expensive vehicles can quickly and easily be adapted for lower-cost cars, and this is where the high-end gives us a clear picture of what is to come. The larger the vehicle, the more tech can be built in right now. As the technology is refined, it will require an increasingly smaller “footprint” to bring the tech to all wheels.
As a result, we looked at the tech in large, seven-seater-plus vehicles, from two rival manufacturers, to get a sense of the future.
The Audi Q7 is a five-seater but, like a business-class cabin on an aircraft, the Audi Q7 offers an “upgrade” to more seat options, with a rear seat bench becoming a third seat through two electrically lowerable seats. That means plenty of room for added features, and the Q7 delivers.
The cockpit offers two large touchscreens, both providing “haptic and acoustic feedback”, meaning they vibrate or make a sound when clicked. More delightfully, however, the lower touchscreen, situated on the centre tunnel console, becomes a 10.1-inch keyboard on which one can input an address either through typing on keys or writing with one’s finger.
Physical input remains superior to voice navigation built into every single car we have seen. The same, however, applies to mapping apps on phones, with Google Maps, Apple Maps and Waze all superior to every on-board navigation app we have yet encountered.
For this reason, integration of Android Auto and Apple CarPlay are critical to getting vehicles future-ready.
The Multi Media Interface (MMI) on the Q7 provided one of the fastest Android Auto pairings we have yet seen, with near-seamless integration of apps. It must have been tempting to keep the Q7 out of the app fray, so advanced is its built-in connectivity.
It offers an embedded SIM and Wi-Fi hotspot, which forms the basis of a range of services that fall under the Audi Connect portfolio, including online traffic, live weather, and a built-in emergency button for calling Audi itself. The portfolio is expanded with a myAudi application, which turns the car and smartphone into a mini-network and allows carfinding as well as remote locking and unlocking.
This depends both on the tech in the car and on the phone, but the interface is so simple, it is easy to see many of these functions becoming standard further down the range. Not so easy is the heads-up display (HUD) — which projects digital information like mapping and speed onto the windscreen in the driver’s line of sight. That is optional even on the Q7, so don’t expect this science-fiction vision to trickle down to the masses any time soon.
For the rest, however, the connected car represented by the Q7 is ready for prime time.
The BMW X7 M50i is described as an SAV (sports activity vehicle) and the first activity it inspires is exploring the vehicle itself.
The six- or seven-seat configurations belie the vast interior, which hides hi-tech options in every corner of BMW’s largest vehicle yet. However, it is the smallest elements that underline the difference, such as a USB port at every seat.
How hard can it be to bring that to every car? Most likely, the thought is harder than the deed. The “user experience” thinking
The digital functionality of expensive vehicles can easily be adapted for lower-cost cars
extends to other features in the back seats, like power controls for adjusting seats, normally exclusive to the front.
Like Audi with its Virtual Cockpit, BMW also embraces the aircraft theme, with its Live Cockpit Professional. It competes aggressively with small airplanes, featuring a 12.3 inch digital instrument cluster and 12.3 inch central information display. Its iDrive 7.0 control system is operated by voice, touchscreen and a touchpad controller.
One again, it is the smartphone integration that truly connects this vehicle to the future. Unusually, it allows simultaneous pairing of more than one device, along with a dedicated microphone for the handset. Such an obvious feature but, then again, apparently not.
The BMW Connected Package Professional offers much the same as Audi Connect, adding a hazard preview and concierge services. Don’t hold your breath for the “intelligent personal assistant” voice control to respond. Much like Audi’s version, it could still learn a thing or two about the alphabet from Google Assistant.
A favourite feature of the X7 is a pair of cup holders, one for keeping a drink hot and one to keep it cold. Like the HUD – also optional on the X7 – don’t expect this feature in economy cars. Nor the individual video screens for the rear passengers. However, the wireless phone charging in both cars is likely to become a required feature for all vehicles.
It is some consolation that, with cars, tech envy may be related to size for now, but it is only a matter of time before every car will feel like driving a smartphone.