Google's got a plan to take over your car and promises to make driving a lot more pleasant. But it brings even bigger benefits to Google.
Android Auto, revealed at the tech giant’s I/O conference Wednesday, will let you plug your Android phone into your car, making the screen in your dashboard a big phone interface, one that's optimized for driving. You'll be able to find your way with Google Maps, stream music from Spotify, and send and receive texts while driving, among other things. Of course it's got voice control so you can do all of this without taking your hands off the wheel.
The technology, which we'll start seeing in cars by the end of the year, will be far better than anything offered by automakers, but then, the stuff offered by automakers couldn't get any worse. It will offer a seamless transition from using our phones to driving our cars. We've already seen 28 automakers sign on, including Audi, Chevrolet, Ford, Honda, Hyundai, Kia, Nissan, Volvo, and VW.
We’ve welcomed Google into our computers, phones, and homes, so there's little reason to expect we won't allow it into our cars. This will bring big benefits, but not just for motorists.
There are three key upsides for Google. Android Auto could make it difficult to switch to an iPhone as long as you own your car. It could give Google a level of control over automakers whose customers may demand it. And it will provide Google an intimate look at our driving habits, providing invaluable data for a company busily building a autonomous car it expects to fundamentally disrupt the auto industry.
On average, Americans hold onto a phone for 20.5 months before ditching it for a new one. For Android users, that’s a chance to switch to an iPhone every two years. We keep cars a lot longer: 71.4 months, to be precise. That works out to three and a half phones in the lifetime of one car. If your car is built to support Android, not IOS, won’t you be more likely to stick with Google when it’s time to upgrade your phone? (The 11 automakers working with Apple CarPlay and Android Auto will decide whether to offer one or both systems in any given car.)
“Google is realizing that in order to really dominate all kinds of mobile devices, they have to embrace the automobile,” says Thilo Koslowski, a Gartner analyst who studies automotive and consumer electronics. “The more devices these companies are conquering, the more bullet-proof they make the ecosystem.”
Consumers who like Android or IOS may happily use their preferred OS on all their devices, including their car. That pushes the automakers out of the infotainment space, which happens to be worth more than $31 billion.
Now that the automakers have given Google and Apple the chance to dominate in-car systems, they may one day find consumers demanding cars that use Android or IOS. They’ll be dependent on Google and Apple to keep their core business going.
Google loves collecting data on us, and if Android Auto is popular, the company will hold of a lot more. The system will give Google a direct look at where car owners go, how they use their navigation systems, what they listen to, if they call and text on the road, and more. This information provides Google with a glimpse into the minds of drivers, says Dr. Jeffrey Miller, an associate professor at the University of South California and member of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers.
That’s a big deal when you consider that Google isn’t just working with the established automakers. It’s building a self-driving car that will directly challenge vehicles on the market today. The more it knows about how we drive, the better it can make a car that gives us what we want.
And once it can build an autonomous car that knows just how we like to get around, Google will be extremely well positioned to charge into, and possibly change, the auto industry.
