Are US and European Customers ready to Embrace Telematics and HMI Features?

LONDON -- June 30, 2014: Smart phones and devices have been omnipresent for half a decade now. As a logical consequence, the car manufacturing industry caught up by allocating a smart device-friendly in-car environment. Even though OEM infotainment systems have evolved in terms of technology and features, customer choices still point towards rather simple smart phone-focussed solutions.

Frost & Sullivan interviewed 1,600 customers in the United States and 2,800 customers across Europe, including the United Kingdom, Italy, France, Germany, and Russia, on their interests and willingness to pay for in-car infotainment, telematics and HMI features. One of the main objectives of the study was to understand the importance of these features from a vehicle purchase perspective, as well as the current availability and usage levels of different features. The results will be presented during an online teleconference on July 9, 2014, at 4:00pm BST / 5:00pm CET / 11:00am EDT / 10:00am CDT.

"The connected car market is evolving at a pace much higher than the traditional automotive industry," states Frost & Sullivan research manager Chandrasekar. "Consumers sadly are not in the centre of this evolution. Over 34 percent of said interviewees were interested in steering wheel controls as an input HMI feature, which marks the highest figure in the survey. The second most appealing feature was wireless charging at 27 percent. Interestingly, over 15 percent of embedded navigation owners in the United States surveyed in the research reported they prefer using smart phone apps for navigation largely because they find the content trustworthy and the app easy to use".

The key objectives of this research were not only to understand the importance of infotainment and telematics features in the overall decision of purchasing a vehicle but also to grasp patterns and trends in regards to the adoption and use of various infotainment and telematics, navigation, and safety features by international consumers. Also, identifying the profiles and segments of those drivers who have a similar disposition towards the adoption of vehicle technologies, navigation, and infotainment features, marked an objective of this study.

Says Chandrasekar: "All of the aforementioned figures and results are alarming indicators that the automotive community is doing a pretty bad job of educating consumers about the latest and greatest in technology innovations".

The briefing will be critical for those who want to understand the various different meta levels involved in this matter: Customer awareness, satisfaction levels, willingness to pay and most importantly the amount of budget consumers allocate towards the aforementioned innovative features when considering the purchase of a new car. Also, the study contains crucial information as to the packaging and marketing strategies of infotainment and telematics features.

The event will be also of value to various teams at vehicle manufacturers ranging from product planning to product marketing, as well as Tier 1 companies, and companies involved in specific technology areas such as smart phone application developers.