The journey of carmakers in the “data” era has taken companies from building their own walled off gardens that they completely control (albeit probably powered by something like Blackberry’s automotive software), to Bring-Your-Own-Device (sure, we can read songs off your iPod!), to now just turning over the car’s infotainment entirely to Google. Is this the best play? Porsche is the latest automaker to face this question.
Other big questions this morning in the Dump: What’s the point of having an electric sub-brand if your whole brand is going to eventually be electric? How much can you trust what the CEO of an electric car company says (no, not that one) on CNBC? Will American companies be the big winners in the EV future?
Porsche Considering Letting Google Into Its Dash
For many consumers, it’s just nice to connect your Android or Apple phone to your car and seamlessly merge your outside-the-car life with your inside-the-car life. To do this, your car needs to have either Android Auto or CarPlay. It works fine!
If you have a different car, say a new Polestar, then Google Maps and Google Assistant are the default and built into the car itself. This means you don’t even need to connect your phone (probably) to access all the features you’d normally use at home. In practice, it works quite well, though when I’m in a car equipped with such a system I often end up just defaulting to running off of my iPhone. The biggest perk is that Google Maps remains the superior mapping option for general travel and if it’s what the car uses, all the better.
There’s a trade-off for automakers in offering this feature, however. Google requires a ton of data, and if an automaker incorporates the tech company’s suite into a car’s system, then that automaker is, in a sense, giving that data (your data) to Google. According to this article in Reuters (“Google, Porsche in talks over Google Apps access”), this is exactly the conundrum Porsche is facing:
Porsche had previously been reluctant to use Google software because Google asked for too much data to be shared, according to Manager Magazin, which first reported the talks.
What works for one automaker (GM, Ford, Polestar all use Google Automotive Services) does not necessarily work for another:
BMW, for example, was “definitely not taking the path” of integrating GAS into its cars, a spokesperson said on Thursday: “It is important to the company to keep hold of the customer interface,” they said.
I’m not sure if Porsche or BMW is making the right call, to be honest. There are advantages to both (advantages, advantages!).
[Editor’s Note: It’s unsurprising that a German carmaker would be reluctant to give out a customer’s data. Germans, in general, are very private people who are often less than keen to give information away if they can avoid it. This is woven into the country’s fabric, perhaps a byproduct of an era in which there simply was no privacy, and spies abounded. My mom, a German, is very private, and frequently when I take photos of cars in Germany, owners ask me to block license plates. Laws in Germany tend to reflect this attitude towards keeping privacy sacred. Sometimes it seems to border a bit on paranoia, but I respect it. -DT].
Mercedes Tossing Out Its EQ Brand Like Yesterday’s Shower Spaghetti
On the other side of Stuttgart, Mercedes has a much easier decision on its hand: Keep the EQ brand for electric cars or transition away from it? The big EV push from Mercedes has come with a new brand, EQ, which is the company’s electric equivalent of AMG and Maybach, but for clean driving as opposed to power or über luxury.
According to an article in Germany daily newspaper Handelsblatt, the company is likely to move away from the branding as the entire company itself looks to electrify. Assuming you don’t read German, Reuters has their own version of the story and I’ll quote from that:
The decision is based on Chief Executive Ola Kaellenius’ focus on electric-only cars, making the EQ brand redundant as Mercedes turns away from the combustion engine, Handelsblatt cited the sources as saying.
There was a time when Netflix was 100% enjoyed by having the company ship you DVDs as opposed to now, when Netflix is 99% algorithm-induced baking competition shows you watch on your phone. And when you pull up “Is It Cake?” on your laptop you aren’t watching Netflix-on-Demand, you’re just watching Netflix.
Ironically, automakers turn like ships and not like cars, so the EQ brand isn’t going to disappear tomorrow. Instead, it sounds like there will be a gentle transition.
Be Careful What You Say On CNBC
Don’t go on CNBC’s show “Squawk Box” unless you know what you’re going to say (unless you’re Alex Pareene) and what you should maybe avoid saying. This is a hard lesson that Lucid CEO Peter Rawlinson learned when he went on the financial program to announce that company had built a factory and was about to produce 6,000 to 7,000 Lucid Airs.
That didn’t quite happen, but Lucid did merge /go public with a SPAC (you can read more about SPACs here) and investors in that SPAC sued saying, those statements were wrong and that these allegedly misleading statements cost them money.
Lucid gained a big victory yesterday when a judge tossed that lawsuit. From a Reuters report on the lawsuit (again!):
U.S. District Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers in Oakland, California said that despite media speculation, Churchill Capital Corp IV shareholders who brought the proposed class action had no reason to know in early 2021 that the SPAC would merge with Lucid.
As a result, she said Lucid Chief Executive Peter Rawlinson’s alleged misleading statements on Feb. 5, 2021 on CNBC’s “Squawk on the Street” could not have been material to their decisions to invest in the SPAC.
This makes sense! Maybe what he said was incorrect, but the two companies were still two separate and unmerged companies with no plans to connect so who cares? Still, be careful what you say on television.
USA! USA! USA!
Thanks to the Inflation Reduction Act and our growing electric car market here in America, it’s America that is benefiting from the electric car revolution. We’ve got Tesla. We’ve got the F-150 Lightning. We’ve got mega-giga-super battery plants opening up and car chargers going in everywhere.
While not every electric car in the United States was sold by an American brand, the vast bulk of them were built in the land of hot dogs, freedom, baseball, and Mountain Dew Code Red.
Automotive News has a piece, “U.S.-made EVs rule the market — and the trend is accelerating,” that uses manufacturing data to highlight this reality:
U.S.-made EVs accounted for about 75 percent of new-vehicle registrations in the first 11 months of last year, Experian data shows, and U.S.-based automakers were responsible for nearly all of the local production. The biggest exception was Nissan, with its Tennessee-built Leaf holding a 1.7 percent EV market share.
And it’s only getting better, baby:
“The emerging EV market opened up a new opportunity to all manufacturers and brands around the world, but the IRA changed that focus,” said Sam Fiorani, vice president of global vehicle forecasting at AutoForecast Solutions.
“The idea of $7,500 per vehicle lit a fire under companies like Hyundai and BMW to speed up their plans to make their EVs in local plants rather than shipping them into the country,” Fiorani added.
Fire up the inflatable pool barbecue, buddy, we’re partying!
The Flush
How do you navigate in your car? Waze? Google Maps? The car’s nav?
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Photos: Google, Porsche, Mercedes, Lucid, Ford
I use Waze for in-car nav. Unfortunately my Miata is an ’18, when ’19 was the first year they had Android Auto built in.
I’m planning on ordering the kit, but I’ll have to reflash the firmware (which scares me) and tear approx half the dash off to install the kit.
Bleh.
My car has carplay and android auto, wired only. So instead of using the nice 13″ screen for navigation, and having to plug/unpug my phone whenever I get in, I just use a 5″ Garmin I’ve had for years, that gets free updates for life, and is ready to navigate faster than my car is ready to be put in gear.
“Porsche had previously been reluctant to use Google software because Google asked for too much data to be shared, according to Manager Magazin, which first reported the talks.”
It’s even simpler than this, in fact.
Google demanded that Porsche give them everything. Absolutely everything. Location, speed, radio, HVAC, paired phone data, owner information, the works. (This was pre-GDPR.) The amount of data manufacturers hand over to Google would incense any reasonable person. Forget Germans. And it’s all neatly ‘legal’ with the shrinkwrap license you agree to any time you start the car.
If Porsche didn’t tell Google to fuck off with their now extremely illegal data demands, they can rest assured, I will not buy anything new from them ever again. (Not that I’m going to as is. Not till they fire the idiots that made all the Cayenne’s buttons shitty capacitive touch with no physical indicators.)
“This makes sense! Maybe what he said was incorrect, but the two companies were still two separate and unmerged companies with no plans to connect so who cares?”
Which, as shady as the whole thing is (nothing legitimate or honest about the SPAC shit at all,) is the correct ruling. What he said was ultimately incorrect but it was not untruthful nor did it address the SPAC. Lucid had, in fact, completed phase one of their 500 acre Casa Grande factory. The Casa Grande factory is, as a point of fact, capable of building the claimed number of cars (actually, more.)
And more importantly, he didn’t say anything about a reverse-merger with a SPAC. Nothing he said would have pointed any investor – savvy or unsavvy – to investing in the SPAC. Investing with Lucid directly? Sure. But that’s not the claim.
The lawsuit claimed that because he said something about a factory, they invested in a SPAC that nobody had any idea Lucid was going to reverse-merge with, and lost money as a result of his statements.
Which is obviously completely bonkers. Fuck these ambulance chasers. Enjoy the fight over the legal bills.
“How do you navigate in your car? Waze? Google Maps? The car’s nav?”
Garmin at this point. Hey folks, you thought Waze would protect you from Google’s panopticon?
Guess what. Google owns Waze. Yup. Bought them in 2013 and has spent every year since doing everything they can to pretend that Waze isn’t Google. Including deliberately withholding certain data between the two to give the false impression they were separate companies.
They’re not. Which is why the FTC reopened their investigation into the Waze acquisition in 2020 on antitrust grounds. Because see above. “Waze or Google Maps,” when they’re one and the same.
If anyone cares where I am and what I’m doing they can have the data. Unless it’s you guys, I’m not putting my real name on this profile.
I tend to navigate by looking at a map first, then remembering where to go. Most likely Google maps on my phone, but not planning a route. I used to plan routes, but then I found I’d accidentally driven past cool stuff I’d have liked to have stopped for.
I’ve got no satnav or screen in the Z4C, so if I get lost I guess I’d have to stop and look at the map. It hasn’t happened in that car yet.
My 86 has satnav, but it’s old enough that the road I live on isn’t on it, and neither is the main road out of the town. So I’ll stick it on when I’m on a long journey, but only for vague directions with the sound off.
My main cycle route goes over a railway crossing that has pedestrian access but is closed for cars. I help maybe 5 cars a year that end up stuck down that road waiting for the gates to open because they are following satnav and didn’t read any of the signs.
“Unless it’s you guys, I’m not putting my real name on this profile.”
Wait, Captain Muppet is not your real name? I feel betrayed.
Maybe I used “real name” wrong. I’ve been Captain Muppet on the internet for 20 years, way more people know me as Captain Muppet than any other name.
Mostly I’m hiding my identity from former employers who either didn’t allow employees publishing public opinions or wouldn’t have like how many hours I was doing that while they were paying me to do something else.
I have also received death threats, and that made me very glad that it takes more than a couple of clicks to find my address. Not that my address will help if they have 2012 vintage satnav.
“What’s the point of having an electric sub-brand if your whole brand is going to eventually be electric?”
Mary Barra has already hinted at this in recent years.
Build up your electric brand, spin it off as a separate entity, and get paid as the market cap increases. Let your legacy business decline along with the demise of IC demand, file bankruptcy, and shut it down. The cash-rich EV firms can pick over the bones of the legacy IC companies.
The Algorithm is only as good as what it’s fed.
I’ve willingly turned over all my personal data to Google and Amazon.
All Hail the Algorithm
“Mercedes Tossing Out Its EQ Brand Like Yesterday’s Shower Spaghetti” – Mercedes didn’t exactly paint themselves into a corner there, though. Their EQ cars are still branded with the 3-pointed star, and people would say they’re “Mercedes” first, before thinking “Oh, there goes an EQ by Mercedes (TM)”. The more interesting companies to watch are the ones that made a completely separate brands, like Volvo and Polestar. Don’t know how that will work in the long run, but I’d guess Polestar will get the axe in the next decade.
The Flush: I’ll normally use Apple Maps through CarPlay, though The Wife uses Google when we plug her phone in. Doesn’t really matter much in the “app” regard. However, I just got a new Mazda CX-30 with HUD, and if I’m going far, I’ll use the built-in nav just so I can have it in the HUD; I’ve got three years of free updates, but I don’t know how long I’ll use the built-in after that.
My first vehicle with HUD and I love that it displays the native nav -or- Google maps through wireless Android Auto. And I just love the HUD period!
In my MKX, I use Google Maps through Android Auto. In my wife’s Tucson, I use Google Maps on my phone wedged between the center console tray and the rear defrost button. In my G6, I use Google Maps on my phone in a holder stuck to the dashboard next to the radio.
Overall, I’m not too worried about Google getting more of my data, since I already use an Android phone, Gmail, Google Maps, etc. They already know more about me than my wife probably does.
I’ve had android head units for years now.
I just created a separate google account for the car. That way, if someone gets in my car all they have is an email address with maps history.
If I need more personal data while on the road, I hook up my phone via Android auto.
It will be the same plan when I get my new GM truck with android automotive.
Problem is that google is smart enough to be able to tie the accounts together. Look at the data starts every morning at the same location. Your phone goes to sleep at that location every night.
Vehicle visits typical male places, or places you have searched on your phone, even just the subject and it will, with high probability, decide that you are the same person.
I have a Polestar, my google account is there since I want to use all the options the vehicle offer like Maps, Spotify, etc. What I do on my phone is now on my car, I don’t know how much Google shares with Polestar but its nice that if I type an address on my phone, it will show up on my car too. I can use google assistant on my phone to give commands to my car like turn on climate control, lock doors, etc. I dont see an issue since it makes my life easier to have both things talking to each ocher. Privacy is not a thing anymore unfortunately …
Google already knows me better than I do. How much more is there to learn? I would prefer them to work with a car maker to have an Android based infotainment system rather than deal with the half baked and buggy software some manufacturers are pushing out.
The best upgrade I did to my cars was to install wireless Android Auto head units. AA works much better than the navigation the cars came with plus the music apps work great! It’s also nice to have actual voice recognition!
My AAA Road Atlas travels wherever I go. Just bought it last year, so I suspect it’ll do me for a while. It’s not that I want to remain totally free of Google — which is impossible these days — but the Old Skool ways still work for me, just as they always have. Yes, the Internet-based maps are more detailed, and easy to use, but I manage.
Of course, I’m resistant to any modern Transportation Device that has touchscreens and all that “connectivity” stuff. I can still turn knobs and push buttons, and can set points and adjust a carburetor. I’m a dinosaur. I’m happy in my Obsolescence.
I use a combination of paper maps and directions written on scraps of paper. I’m not a sufficiently hardcore geologist (I’m a mantle mineralogist) that I insist on using topo maps whenever possible, but I do know one guy who does.
I usually use my iPhone for navigation, unless I’m in my 2017 Fiat 500e and I’ll sometimes use the hilariously antiquated TomTom system built into the car. I test drove two EVs recently and one of the major factors in my decision to lease the Polestar 2 instead of the Mach-E was integrated Google Automotive Services. The Mach-E had nothing but very basic, almost useless, services available unless you synced your phone. And even then, it couldn’t do anything really useful (like trip-planning) unless you also loaded the Ford Pass app. On the other hand, the Polestar 2 is 100% fully functional without any phone connected. Add in the fact that the infotainment system in the P2 is faster, smoother and easier to use than the Ford, and I said “Gimme the GAS!”
As for privacy, if you already have a smartphone of any flavor, you’re already compromised. If you don’t, then you have my deepest respect and admiration. Even my super privacy-focused German wife admits that it’s a losing battle and all we can do is try to minimize our exposure by turning off as much invasive use of the technology as we can.
Sharing data: I don’t want my argument to fall into whataboutism, but here I go. By installing Google Maps, the user shares their real-time location. When they use Google Maps to navigate to a location, they share intention data. At least Google discloses it collects this data AND the user can see the data Google collects.
Apple Maps’ ToS states, “We do not collect personal information associated with your Maps usage…” which seems pretty broad and consumer friendly. It’s also difficult to believe.
If you do not want your location data collected, leave your cell phone at home — or better yet don’t use a cell phone — and use a dumb sat-nav or paper map to find your way around.
Mazda keeps trying to get me to buy map updates for my 2014 Mazda3. I think I had two years of free updates, so it’s got 2016 maps in there, but without live traffic reporting it’s totally useless in a city. I just have Google Maps on my phone, mounted near the infotainment screen.
Google Maps via Android Auto in my Volt or my Cobalt (wireless in the Cobalt!), and typically someone else with Google Maps on their phone in the Cruze, and I basically have to just guess in my ’81 Z28 (though I don’t really take it anywhere far that I’m not familiar with).
People saying they don’t want Google/Apple in their car while carrying a smartphone and paying with credit/debit.
For people who think apple is some benevolent company who won’t sell your data, you have been had.
Cell carriers also sell all that data so unless we get laws changing that I’ll take the convenience of it in car.
I use my in car navigation most because I daily a Tesla. It the past it was Android Auto and Waze. I thought I would miss Android Auto more but Tesla updates their software.
I don’t want legacy manufacturers locking out Car Play or Android Auto because they don’t update their software or maps. A map update on my 2019 Charger was $150. That’s idiotic. The Charger also cost more for remote app use and Sirius Guardian which are features I pay $10 a month to Tesla for were about $40 on the charger.
Google Maps via Android Auto in the Niro or just on the phone in my pickup. And I can’t get too worried about my car sending Google data, since they know where I go already. Will be weird if I start to see oil filter ads around maintenance time or something, but not any worse than current data tradeoffs. If they could get more info via my car than my phone, it would be truly shocking.
I have a 2012 Prius v. When I need navigation, I have Google Maps run on my phone in a holder.
I’m planning to put in an Alpine 9″ floating screen head unit to get Android Auto, but it’s pricey and it’s not the right time for me. Plus I need to get some “iDataLink Maestro” interface to retain access to the car settings like “headlamp delay after engine off” and “lock on shift from park”. Hopefully this year, but I guess I’ll see.
My car is kind of ancient (first registered in early 2016), and it does not have an “infotainment system” to speak of — it has a radio with Bluetooth connectivity. So I have my phone in a Qi charging pad holder on the dash and use Waze to navigate and either Spotify or the car radio for entertainment.
“My 2016 is so ancient!” Laughs in 1995 and 1968.
A Rand McNally road atlas from 2003. If the streets have changed since then, it’s probably not a place worth going to anyway.
Interesting take on things. I’d rather have said “if the roads haven’t changed in 20 years, the place is probably not worth going to anyway”. 🙂
Deals Gap appears in the 2003 edition of Rand McNally, so…
In the Camaro, I use carplay with google maps. In the truck, it’s google maps on the phone either sitting on my seat telling me directions or in my girlfriend’s hands and her telling me directions.
It’s obviously tempting to say “share nothing with them”, but I use Google Maps already, so it’s not as if I’m taking any kind of principled stand.
Nor do I necessarily think it’s any better or worse to share vehicle data with tech companies than with car companies. I don’t expect either of them to have my best interests in mind when they harvest it.
I guess my attitude on the matter is more of a resigned acceptance of this kind of thing being the necessary price to exist in a modern society. The fact that I can use a device that fits in my pocket to call anyone in the world, look up anything in the world, navigate to anywhere in the world, etc all for a price that basically everyone can afford, means there’s going to be a tradeoff. Yes, it would probably be better if my car wasn’t actively harvesting my info as well, but considering I’m going to have my phone with me all the time anyways, what really is the difference?
Exactly this.
I already have an android phone, so google already has mountains of my info. Why not a little more at this point.
Resigned acceptance is spot on. As long as it doesn’t actively negatively affect us, what the hell.
Apple users will have their data shared with BOTH Apply AND Google in that case. 🙂
Agreed. I’m numb to it these days. The massive amount of effort it takes to try to block Big Tech from collecting all that info about me, and then only to find out that it was all for naught and they get it all anyway… yeah, I’m done. I don’t give a crap anymore. It’s not worth the trouble.
Exactly! If the price of all that is EvilCorpLLC gets to know which public roadside rest stops I use to relieve myself and how long that takes so be it!
(Besides it’s not like people aren’t already Facebooking that kind of TMI anyway.)
Not like either the phone or car company won’t sell data to EVERY BIDDER.
I use Waze to check on traffic and Google for day to day. My partner insists on using Apple maps despite it screwing things up for us on several occasions. Now if I am driving and need some on the fly directions I hand her my phone with any other option already open.