Consumer Electronics Show highlights automotive advances
The Consumer Electronics Show (CES) was previously viewed as primarily a consumer goods exhibition – games, televisions, etc. However, the most recent CES in Las Vegas hosted the largest contingency of automotive-related exhibitors, exhibits and new products in the show's history.
The big question remains – what impact will these consumer automotive technologies have on the independent aftermarket?
CES 2014: Sensory Overload
More than 120 automotive suppliers and at least nine OEMs exhibited new products and presented new technologies during the "sensory-overloaded" CES. In fact, there seemed to be more new automotive product launches at CES than are planned at the mega-car shows scheduled for the next few weeks.
AASA member companies were highly visible with new automotive technologies for the world to see and experience. These included:
• Robert Bosch demonstrated driverless vehicle technology through pedestrian protection and automated parking.
• DENSO's V2X technology enables vehicle-to-vehicle and vehicle-to-infrastructure connectivity.
• Delphi exhibited an array of items including 360-degree sensing and cross-traffic alerting for automated driving, infotainment apps, voice recognition, driver attention-monitoring systems and plug-n-play aftermarket telematics solutions.
• Valeo demonstrated automated valet parking, eye control and full LED lighting (intelligent lighting that automatically dims) technologies.
• Visteon highlighted its technologies for eye and head control, gesture recognition for virtual cockpit control and cloud computing to protect vehicle communication network security.
Consumer Automotive Technologies and the Aftermarket
The challenge is to identify the relevance that the CES hype around new consumer automotive technologies has to the independent aftermarket. Several suppliers, as evidenced by the list above, already are positioned with product development for consumers as part of their transportation experience: infotainment, safety and vehicle maintenance.
Possible applications of “the Internet of the Aftermarket,” Big Data, connected systems, wearable electronics, etc. for more traditional product categories could be:
• Real time support and aids for repair professionals using Google Glass or other augmented reality devices to view, diagnose and project onto vehicles to simplify the process and identify required parts
• Data collected from sensors on parts could be combined with regional terrain and weather data, historical replacement rates, driver habits/tendencies and even social media/website comments to predict parts failure more accurately.
• Since there will be a time of a mixed vehicle parc with driverless-capable vehicles traveling “connected” roads and highways, the possibilities for aftermarket technology to enhance older vehicles are virtually boundless.
Technology is moving the aftermarket far beyond e-tailing – new opportunities now lie in complete digital integration. The aftermarket is on the cusp of the digitization of the automotive service and parts value chain. AASA will spotlight this important trend for discussion at its 2014 Vision Conference.
Editor’s note: This is part one in the AASA Supplier Essentials series, Innovation Through Technology: This series will spotlight the impact of consumer automotive technologies on the independent aftermarket and its suppliers.
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