The document discusses 10 stakes in the future of cars' user experience. As cars become connected to the internet and each other, they will open up opportunities for improved navigation via crowdsourced data, multi-screen experiences, shared mobility services, and communication between drivers and other road users. Cars will also provide valuable data that can help manufacturers improve products and services, while cities can use car-generated information to manage traffic and infrastructure. However, integrating these complex technological and business model changes will challenge automakers' traditional design and production methods.

1. 10 Stakes In Cars User Experience

4. Cars have been autonomous a long time before
Google. Not autonomous in the way we think today.
They were not driving alone. The were still relaying
on the knowledge and reflexes of their driver.
However, they were closed environments. Like
bubbles isolated from the outside. Mobiles
communication devices, and then smartphones and
eventually, cars connectivity have opened a breach
in this bubble. Waze for instance provides real time
crowdsourced information on the road around. It
changes dramatically the driving experience.

6. Cars cockpits are already multi-screens systems.
The challenge however is that those screens are still
provided by different manufacturers, based on
several operating systems and above all are not
connected each others. With the instrument panel,
the inboard media screen, the mobile device of the
driver, using 3 screens while driving is common.
Some professional drivers like Uber affiliates can use
some more. With smart-watches, even more
screens are coming. Since a few years some
standards as raised to fill the gaps between screens
as MirroLink or appleCarPlay. There is still work to
do in order to make the car multi-screen
experience seamless.

8. In many countries, the car ownership model is
changing. Moving from a individual transportation
mean to a shared mobility tool. It has led to the rise
of new services. Some based on fleets managed by
organizations and some shaped as peer to peer
services. Cars itself have to evolve in order to
manage this new relationship with their drivers.
Integrate services facilitating sharing and multi
drivers use as geolocation, keyless access and start,
user recognition and personalization.

10. The breach in the car’s driver bubble by allowing
permanent connection with the world outside has
opened the car experience to passengers, relatives,
other road users and transportation means. A
mobile application like Glympse already allows
drivers to share in real time their location and their
estimated arrival time. New cars lighting technology
based on LED or LCD will also allow direct
communication. The design of a new form of
communication based on ethic and politeness
between road users is a fascinating challenge.

12. Thanks to their connection to the Internet, cars can
now be seen as data providers. This amount of
information, based on real use will be a huge asset
for car manufacturers. Allowing them to improve
their products design and to create new services
with fewer financial risks because they will be based
on measurable insights. Data is also an opportunity
to improve even more car reliability and security.
It will help to identify more accurately the causes of
their crash or failures and prevent them.

14. Cars have and will still play a central role in city. They
have already shaped the eastern cities by allowing
the development of suburbs. Seen alternatively as a
vital blood or an enemy, cars will have to manage
the constraints of reducing dramatically their
pollutant emissions. In an other hand they can help
the cities authorities to improve their public
services through the data they will create. They
will provide in real time information allowing to
anticipate traffic congestion, identify dangerous
areas or roads needing to be repaired, and eventually
support city planning.

16. The automotive industry is emblematic of the first
industrial revolution and could be a symbol of the
disruptions created by the third one. The raise of 3D
printing allows to build cars parts - if not the whole -
outside of the industrial plants. The electric drive
reduce the complexity of the traditional power train
and could provide more flexibility and modularity to
the cars makers than before. It may at least
partially challenge the industrial vertical supply
chain and led to the rise of a new generation
of cars makers : smaller companies, communities
dedicated on addressing the very specifics needs of
some very specifics market segments.

18. As connected objects, cars may also be able to
communicate with each others. It could led to the
development of an ants like distributed intelligence
dedicated to risks preventions and trafic fluidity
making the road safer and more efficient.
Tomorrows autonomous cars may behaves as
swarms or migratory birds. As they may move
as animals rather than machines, the relationship
between drivers and their car has to be rethought.

20. Complexity is challenging the way cars have been
designed since more than a century. Cars have now
to integrate a huge amount of constraints to
manage costs, security, environmental policies. By
becoming smart and connected, they also have to
manage their integration in a larger ecosystem of
smart and connected objects. None of the
automotive brands today, even the bigger, is able
to manage alone all the car ecosystem. They have
to be open to cross industries collaboration and
integrate to co-design within their process.

22. Variable 1
– A technologic disruption with the electric power
that will change dramatically the car design
principles and the logistic built around the fuel
powered car.

23. Variable 2
– A business model disruption with the
permanent connection to the Internet
transforming the car in a smart and connected
devices with the ability to receive and send
information.

24. Variable 3
– An user experience disruption by gaining more
and more autonomy with the time.

25. Theses 3 disruption are related to each others and
can produce an incredible amount of valid scenarios
risks and opportunities.
As designers, we have to be fast on our feet and
keep in mind that each of them can be challenged at
any time by the unpredictable rise of a new
technology, innovative services or a radical cultural
shift.