Voice on Wheels
Supercharge your driving experience with hands-free technology
On Sunday, my wife and I will be taking the three-hour drive from our home to the Berkshires to drop our son off at camp for the summer.
My wife is a great navigator. But she’s no voice assistant. (And I mean that in the best possible way for both our sakes.)
On the drive to Massachusetts, I’d love to be able to ask my car to tell me where the nearest gas station is. Or where there’s a good spot for a picnic lunch. It’d be interesting to ask my car if there was anything notable in the town we’re passing through. Or if any of my direct ancestors settled in the Berkshires when they emigrated from Europe.
Even better: it would be great to ask my car about my meetings for the week. And it’d be a bonus if my car could make dinner reservations for our friends that are visiting from Arizona.
Sure, a Google Assistant or Siri on a smartphone can handle some of those requests. But using mobile assistants is unwieldy when it comes to hands-free driving.
Luckily, the promise of the in-car voice assistant is becoming a reality. It won’t be here in time for our road trip to the Berkshires, but consumers — especially millennials — are ready for it.
The embrace of in-car voice technology is part of a larger evolution of the automotive industry. There’s the current acceleration of the electric car future and the eventual acceptance of autonomous vehicles.
In the background is “the post-mobile future” that companies like Samsung are preparing for in the next decade.
Voice Assistants Get An AI Tune-Up
I’ve noted before that the smart speaker revolution that began a decade ago didn’t live up to the hype. This time is different, however. As generative artificial intelligence becomes embedded in all industries, it’s safe to expect a turbocharged expansion of voice activated assistants capabilities and the use cases that go with them.
That’s one major reason why the global In-car voice assistant market size is projected to rise significantly from the current 125 million U.S. drivers use voice control technology today.
More than 60% of drivers who’ve used a voice assistant report that when buying a car, having an in-car voice assistant is a factor and 13% report that it’s a significant consideration, according to Voicebot.ai’s analysis. About 70% of vehicles expected to be connected to the internet over the course of 2023, making in-car voice assistants poised to be considered an essential technology.
There are a few roadblocks. Will automakers opt to create their own proprietary voice activation systems? Tesla, Mercedes, and BMW already do.
It seems unlikely that other car companies will follow that trio’s path. The costs of building and maintaining these systems are costly.
At the opposite end, Ford Motor Company and Lincoln Motor Company have Amazon Alexa Built-In, while Volvo Cars, General Motors, Polestar, and Renault rely on Google Android Automotive OS. Outside of the car’s control systems, smartphone users can tether their Google Android Auto to their vehicle’s” infotainment systems.” Apple’s CarPlay connects iPhones to cabin displays, with full Siri voice assistant support.
All those options are unsatisfying. It brings the lack of interoperability of the Connected Home, where separate brands’ devices can’t work together, to the car. Consumers want to be able to use all their assistants in one simple, seamless system.
Honda and Sony’s Driving Lessons
Nevertheless, if each in-car voice assistant can provide a greater level of interaction and user experience, it’ll be a win. My expectation is that we’ll see fuller partnerships like the one I saw previewed at CES in January by Honda and Sony.
Over a year ago, the two Japanese brand giants created an electric vehicle joint venture. The first prototype of that effort is called “Afeela.”
With so many automakers well into the electric future, why did Honda need Sony to build a new EV model? Because the ride is about more than just the drive.
Afeela’s features go beyond how the vehicle is powered. It’s about elevating and responding to consumers’ expectations about the connection between devices and their media.
Honda and Sony realized that to get at the full potential of emerging tech — which encompasses the connected home, connected office, the connected car — they couldn’t just go it alone if they wanted to produce genuine breakthroughs.
Adding “features” isn’t enough for any manufacturer, electronic or automotive. Afeela aspires to become a “Mobility Tech Company.” By themselves, Sony and Honda couldn’t credibly move that brand identity forward. Shared equity is what it takes.
In addition to its 45 sensors as a “connected car,” Afeela also has a grille-mounted “Media Bar” that will display detailed charging and vehicle information, "which allows intelligent mobility to express itself to surrounding people using light, enabling interactive communication between mobility and people."
But are such features enough to get beyond the hype cycle?
Hype Is On The Road Again
During my Israel trip two weeks ago, I met with a company that is working on “proactive conversational AI agents” for cars. I was impressed. The conversations were about very simple use cases. There were no “mind-blowing” promises. Just features that made me think, “This would really make driving a lot easier.”
Things like asking your car where the button to pop the trunk is. Or telling your car to lower the temperature to 65 degrees. Asking your car to explain details from the interactive manual is game-changing — who ever reads those documents anyway?
In terms of the hype cycle and in-car voice, let’s look back at what Gartner had to say about the peaks and valleys to come.
You can see on the curve, virtual assistants were headed down the “Trough of Disillusionment.” Meanwhile, connected car platforms were looking up the “Plateau of Productivity.”
The expectation that cars would be able to share data with each other, and to know when they were getting too close, were becoming a bigger deal doesn’t tell us much about how to prepare for growth or false stops and starts that any emerging technology experiences in its formative stages.
Hype cycles don’t touch on the practical details that brands and manufacturers have to contend with. For example, the big challenge for automakers right now is where to put the cup holders because technology systems are taking more space in the production of an automobile.
It’s not an insurmountable problem. But if a driver doesn’t have a place to put their coffee after having their in-car voice assistant order ahead at the Dunkin’ on the way to Berkshires, that vehicle owner is not going to be too happy with that “advancement.” Finding the solutions to small things people care about is the way past the hype.
Anyway, I better hit the road now. Honk — or comment — on your expectations for the future of the automotive industry.