In-Car Wireless Tech Moving Beyond Infotainment

Consumers who have long been interested in portable digital media and streaming internet radio are now beginning to use these outlets regularly in the car.

As usage of these features has now overtaken the CD player in many key demographics, this presents a key question: if CD players are falling out of favor, what will replace them? A new report from the In-vehicle UX (IVX) group at Strategy Analytics “2017 Infotainment Usage and Interest: Digital Music Fragmenting the Landscape”, has found that the in-vehicle media landscape in the US, Western Europe and China is fragmented. The trend to portable digital media and streaming internet radio has important implications not just for the future of in-car radio, but for the advance of CarPlay and Android Auto.

Key report findings include:

• Radio: Broadcasters need to more rapidly embrace and promote dedicated apps for their stations. Becoming compatible with mirroring solutions such as Apple CarPlay or Android Auto will ensure they remain competitive in the long run
• CD Players: Usage and interest for CD players continues to fall; less than half of consumers surveyed in each region that have CD players use them weekly. They continue to be used less frequently than any other infotainment source
• Digital music: Whether stored or streamed, digital music is the emerging leader for in-vehicle infotainment for the next several years. The rise and acceptance of mirrored systems such as Apple CarPlay, Android Auto, and Baidu CarLife is leading to serious implications for many in the traditional infotainment landscape

Derek Viita, Senior Analyst and report author commented, “Interest is turning into usage: Android Auto and CarPlay owners are relying on their mirrored system for most (if not all) of their media-related tasks. This is particularly interesting from a UX viewpoint: in our numerous benchmarks of on-market systems, consumers tend to find integrated implementations of apps and services to be confusing at best and unusable at worst. Mirrored systems are reported as ‘usable and delightful’.”

Added Chris Schreiner, Director of Syndicated Research, UXIP, “For OEMs, the success of CarPlay and Android Auto leads to a strategic question as to how much to support embedded infotainment going forward. Many factors play into this, including the prioritization of having control over the daily touchpoint of infotainment and the demographic profile of the brand’s targeted consumer. Recommendations would need to be addressed on a case-by-case basis.”