Car manufacturers are going green and aiming for the cloud. The coming years will see an uptick in connected vehicles says a new IHS iSuppli report. Expect a new suite of apps, and traditional radio stations to make way for Internet-based music services.
IHS Automotive Research Service says Internet radio will make its way into 24 million cars via head units around the world by 2018. To put that into perspective, last year less than 200,000 cars with the feature were produced - 149,000 of which were sold in the U.S. Additionally, the firm believes that vehicle-specific apps and increased connectivity with other devices such as smart phones could help create a thriving new market for both vehicle manufacturers and software developers to tap.
Egil Juliussen, principal analyst for automotive infotainment, expects the combination of Internet radio and unique apps will draw in users as connected cars become more common.
"The next several years will see an explosion in the use of in-vehicle apps in cars, driven by booming shipments of automobiles employing head units designed to integrate cloud-based content," said Juliussen. "These apps, whether built into cars or provided via connected mobile devices like smartphones, will provide a range of infotainment, entertainment, remote diagnostics and navigation services."
The analyst added that Internet radio will blaze the trail for the "in-vehicle app revolution" since music has been the automobile's killer app for decades. To that end, IHS predicts that Apple's iCloud service (which is currently in developer beta and launches this fall) will become a fixture for car-based entertainment. Other companies, including Spotify and Pandora (the "de facto cloud-based Internet radio app"), could successfully leverage subscription-based services and nudge drivers' dials away from free radio the group said.
What do you think about more Internet-ready cars? Do drivers really need more distractions and buttons to push on the road? Let us know in the comment section.
