GM is ditching Apple CarPlay and Android Auto for all electric vehicles from next year
Tip for antitrust lawyers: General Motors will begin phasing out Apple CarPlay and Android Auto from its e-cars starting with the 2024 Chevy Blazer. The automaker wants more control over data collection with a custom infotainment operating system built in partnership with Google. He intends to use the collected information to see how customers drive and charge their electric vehicles.
CarpPlay and Auto are very popular technologies from Apple and Google that allow vehicle owners to display their phones on their car’s infotainment system. Customers can use the phone’s navigation features or stream music rather than using the standard infotainment system, which, to be honest, is lacking in many mainstream models.
The change only applies to e-cars coming in 2024 and beyond. Reuters notes that gasoline-powered vehicles and current electric vehicles will remain unaffected. It will be interesting to see how this will affect Google Motors – er – GM electric vehicle sales in 2024 and beyond. Google has a dubious reputation for collecting data, and GM may be influenced by this opinion. In addition, a recent survey showed that almost half of all car buyers want their infotainment systems to support CarPlay and Android Auto, while nearly 80 percent of Apple users surveyed demand CarPlay support in their cars.
Apple is sure to be disappointed by this move. It has struggled to compete with Android Auto, another Google data mining project. General Motors only started making its infotainment systems compatible with CarPlay a few years ago. It will be amusing to watch regulators go after Google with antitrust lawsuits for kicking Apple out of its ASS (automotive services sector) by blocking it from accessing future GM vehicles.
Google has been reportedly working with GM on its infotainment system since 2019. The joint venture’s progress has focused on moving from simple software that controls your radio and a few other functions to software that is tightly coupled to more of the car’s computers, including the GM Super. Cruise is an automated driver assistant.
“We have a lot of new driver assistance features that are more closely related to navigation,” Mike Hichme, executive director of GM Digital Cockpit Experience, told Reuters. “We don’t want to design these features in such a way that they depend on [a] man with mobile phone.
In terms of features, the new infotainment system will have everything you’d probably expect from Google, including Google Maps and Google Assistant. These services will be free to owners for eight years from the date of purchase. While it won’t be available initially, GM plans to eventually add Spotify and Audible to its infotainment system. Over time, other popular applications will also be added to the system, but details are not mentioned.
It’s also worth noting that customers will still be able to use their phones to make calls or send text messages via voice commands using their iPhones and Androids. However, this will be via Bluetooth and not via CarPlay or Auto.
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