Truemag

  • Newsletters
  • Thought Leadership
  • Mobility
  • Safety
  • Work Trucks
  • Videos
  • Home
  • Subscribe
  • Contact Us
  • Advertise
  • Who We Are

The Real Auto Revolution Is Already Happening—Inside the Car

Wired

The car has long proved a cornerstone of American life, inextricably tied to almost everything people do in work, life, leisure, and business.

It is also a marker of our contemporary moment, distilling and reacting to cultural cues—think of the bombastic muscle cars of the Vietnam era, and the trepidatious econo-boxes that arrived in its wake. That won’t change anytime soon, but the car will undergo radical change—from the inside out.

“I look at the exterior as the love at first site, and the interior as the long-term relationship,” says says Derek Jenkins, chief of design for California electric vehicle startup Lucid Motors.

“That’s very much where you have to spend time, intimate time, with the vehicle. It’s physical, it’s hands-on. It’s where you really either appreciate the product, or it annoys you.”

New powertrains and new technologies are likely to makeover the automotive interior far more in the next five to ten years than anything seen since Cadillac brought out the first enclosed car in 1910. Cars are learning to drive themselves and starting to talk to each other. They are running on electricity and ditching the family garage.

“Autonomy, connected technologies, electrification, and the share movement. Those four pillars are changing expectation and changing the use case of the interior simultaneously,” Jenkins says.

Some of this rise in the interior’s importance is based on the trickle-down impact of logistics. The average American commute has increased by more than twenty percent since 1980, and globally in mega-cities like Beijing and Cairo, time in the car can stretch out toward the unimaginable. And so people create more requirements of their vehicle.

“The interior of an automobile used to be nothing more than a soft bench seat and a roof to keep occupants comfortable and out of the elements,” says Michael Harley, executive analyst for industry research firm Kelley Blue Book. “Today, it’s a safety cage, a music amphitheater, a telephone conference room, a place to eat meals, and more. Vehicles are no longer machines that simply move people between two points, and shoppers demand much more from the interior than they did even a decade ago.”

Another driver of interior innovation? The vehicle safety and crashworthiness regulations cramp the creativity of exterior designs by necessitating features like smaller windows and blunter front grilles. Combined with the immutability of aerodynamics, you can see why so many cars these days look the same. As exterior design becomes more generic, the interior can shine as a point of differentiation.

The shifting nature of the auto industry will produce more change. Looking for economies of scale, automakers now create “global vehicles”—cars that can be sold in any market around the world. So demands in one region, especially a big markets like China, for things like enhanced rear legroom, mood-enhancing multi-colored ambient lights, and in-car perfume atomizers, find their way across the oceans.

Read more of the original article at Wired.

May 8, 2017connieshedron
Donlen Increases Fleet Driver Productivity With Updates to DonlenDriver™ Mobile AppClose Gaps in Fleet Safety to Avoid Negligent Entrustment Liability, Part One
Recent Posts
  • Should Big Screens Be Banned From Cars?
  • Biden Admin. Makes EV Credits Available to More Buyers
  • Electrify America Raises its Charging Prices by Up to 25 Percent
  • US Dept. Of Defense Inches Closer to Tactical Electric Vehicles
  • Billions of Miles is Just the Start for Mentor by eDriving
  • Fleet Services That Streamline Time Management are Effective Cost-Saving Measures
  • 10 Least Satisfying Cars, According to Consumer Reports
  • A Call to Action: Planning a Customer-Centric Sales Strategy
  • J.D. Power’s Newest Index Will Track EV Market Monthly Growth
  • FMW: New Branding and Marketing Support for Fleet Product and Service Providers
ASSOCIATION NEWS
NAFA 2023 I&E Features Sessions on Fleet Electrification, Management Best Practices & More
NAFA Taps Hillstaffer to Lead Legislative Efforts
NETS New Fatigue Management Guide is Now Available
2023 NAFA I&E: Attend Education Sessions from Expert Fleet Managers
2023 NAFA I&E: Register Now for Early Bird Savings
Top Business and Leadership Experts to Keynote NAFA 2023 Institute & Expo
The 2023 100 Best Fleets Awards Are Now Open!
TECHNOLOGY
A Complete Guide on Enterprise Fleet Maintenance
Supervision’s Adam Danielson Talks about the Growing Need for Fleets to Identify High-Risk Drivers
Reviver’s Alex Dimitrijevic Explains the Three Core Values of Digital License Plates
Ford’s BlueCruise Ousts GM’s Super Cruise as CR’s Top-Rated Active Driving Assistance System
Carmakers Have Another Screen in Their Sights: Your Windshield
FMW Talks to LifeSaver Mobile’s Ted Chen about Fighting Driver Distraction
Transportation Sector Ripe for Transformation, Federal Officials Say
CONFERENCES & WEBINARS
Upcoming NETS Conferences: Save the Dates!
NAFA 2023 I&E Features Sessions on Fleet Electrification, Management Best Practices & More
2023 NAFA I&E: Attend Education Sessions from Expert Fleet Managers
2023 NAFA I&E: Register Now for Early Bird Savings
Fleet Success Summit 2023: Why It’s a Must for Fleet Professionals
2023 NAFA Institute & Expo: Registration is Open!
NTEA Extends Work Truck Week® 2023 Exhibit Hours; New Exhibitor Pavilion Returns
INDUSTRY ANNOUNCEMENTS
NAFA 2023 I&E Features Sessions on Fleet Electrification, Management Best Practices & More
Element CEO/President Jay Forbes to Retire, Announces Successor
Motus Taps New CEO to Drive Continued Transformation
NAFA Taps Hillstaffer to Lead Legislative Efforts
2023 NAFA I&E: Attend Education Sessions from Expert Fleet Managers
Smith System Acquires Driving Dynamics
Fleet Success Summit 2023: Why It’s a Must for Fleet Professionals

Fleet Management Weekly Newsletter Archive
Access to back issues of the FMW newsletter.

FMW Mobility
How mobility is rapidly changing the fleet management landscape.

Newsletter

Subscribe

FMW Fleet Videos
Video clips of industry leaders speaking on a variety of engaging hot topics in fleet.

2014-2020 © Fleet Management Weekly