Connected Cars

[burwoodman]

Do cars that connect to the internet use ones own smartphone to connect? I've read various articles on the new tech coming out soon but i'm not a techie and don't understand how the car makes a connection unless it has a device that must be subscribed to/connected to vodaphone et al.

I can understand a wi fi connection when parked up at certain locations

[sherman]

They usually have a slot somewhere for you to put a SIM card in and turn your car into a 2 tonne mobile phone.

[Fas1975]

Do a search on M2M (Machine to Machine). I closed a deal earlier this year to support BMW's expansion into this market. BMW have embedded SIM cards into the vehicles themselves, this will give you the connection to web-services. Search BMW Connected Drive. BMW have embdedded SIM cards in their vehicles for a few years, but restricted the services to emergency services, i.e. car crashes, airbags deploy, someone calls the car and gets emergency services to you.

Now BMW want to enhance the services and offer content directly into the vehicle, but fundamentally, the data connection is via the mobile network.

Your contract is with BMW, BMW has a commercial agreement with Vodafone and T-Mobile to deliver the service.

[burwoodman]

Fas1975 said:

Do a search on M2M (Machine to Machine). I closed a deal earlier this year to support BMW's expansion into this market. BMW have embedded SIM cards into the vehicles themselves, this will give you the connection to web-services. Search BMW Connected Drive. BMW have embdedded SIM cards in their vehicles for a few years, but restricted the services to emergency services, i.e. car crashes, airbags deploy, someone calls the car and gets emergency services to you.

Now BMW want to enhance the services and offer content directly into the vehicle, but fundamentally, the data connection is via the mobile network.

Your contract is with BMW, BMW has a commercial agreement with Vodafone and T-Mobile to deliver the service.

OK, I get it. Like a servicing package perhaps. 3 years X££. Thanks

[Fas1975]

burwoodman said:

OK, I get it. Like a servicing package perhaps. 3 years X££. Thanks

Actually, BMW's pricing for connected drive services is interesting. There will be connected apps which you'll get as dealer incentives which will be free to you for the period you own the car, others will be free-trial ranging from a couple of months to 3 years, after that you need to pay, then there are others which are pay as you go.

There are still murky areas in M2M, especially around roaming agreements, revenue share, what happens when you sell the car, unit replacements etc. but BMW hope to have 2million connected cars globally by 2020.

Here's the vision

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wzGnzWgWTAg

Mercedes, Peugeot, Renault, Toyota are all developing their own tech as well.

[MrChips]

^^ whilst utilising an inboard sim is the longer term plan, much of the "connected" elements that have been around for a couple of years do utilise a 3G connection from an iPhone or similar.

Take MINI for example, you can use your 3G connection to connect the in car display to Facebook, twitter, or display RSS news feeds, or search Google places directly ad load the results directly into the nav.

I think the best stuff to come out of all this connectivity so far is the emergency service stuff, and real time traffic info.