Things that will sell the next car

Tuesday, January 29th, 2008 @ 11:50 pm | Automotive, Electronics

Embracing technology. I see car companies who focus too much on specs. Ok, for me I would rather take a 2002 Camaro over a nice civic, but for the majority of people it is more about interface.

Make something innovative, I keep stressing to make the inside of the car more high tech. Make an LED / LCD dash, make it open source. The after market would love it, and people would too. Imagine a car, that allowed you to sync your ipod/zune/MP3 player with your car. Not only that but show your song and playlist on the dash. An LCD dash would allow you to scroll through multiple slow changing gages in the same space, opening up new areas for innovative ideas. LCD prices are cheap compared to the price of a car, implementing it would significantly alter the price of a vehicle.

Wireless NAS, imagine a day when you get in your car and the newest songs you have are already there. These things are only a couple hundred dollars, but the utility they provide is huge. Ok, imagine you had some “legitimately owned videos” on a folder in your car. You go to your girlfriends house and you want to watch some movies, wait, just go to the network folder on the wifi network and watch it on the TV. Now, you say that not everyone has Wifi and a media center at home. PEOPLE WILL, be ready.

Touch screen HVAC and Radio, now these thins are also coming down. Get rid of the ugly radios and HVAC controls, and bring in a nice slick LCD / LED. I know LCD aren’t good in cold weather but LED can work and the first automaker to do it will be seen as an innovator and a company that is willing to take chances. GM and the rest of the domestic industry typically has a reputation of lagging and only going with proven technology.

Ok, now I am going to go on a little bit of a rant, people that worry about 10-20% fuel economy on a car is ridiculous, I would rather picked the car I liked over a 20% gain in fuel economy. That cost on a yearly basis is almost negligible compared to insurance, and the other costs associated with owning a car.