Not to be outdone by General Motors with its investment in Lyft, its acquisition of Cruise and its launch of Maven, BMW is in the process of relaunching and expanding the DriveNow car share service in the U.S. and may soon provide aftermarket hardware to enable Mini lessees to rent their cars, according to a Bloomberg report.
Author: Roger C. Lanctot
Car Leasing, Car Sharing Don’t Mix
Stop the Dashboard Insanity!
Speaking as part of the digital track at this week’s NAB confab, John Ellis proclaimed the demise of the dashboard radio in the coming world of automated vehicles. The headline reporting his talk in Tom Taylor’s newsletter was “Radio is on a path to extinction in the vehicle.”There’s no point in being subtle … Read More
On Driving as Surfing
Driving a car is increasingly like surfing the Web. The day will soon arrive when highway on-ramps are equipped with signs asking you to accept cookies. Those drivers refusing to accept cookies may be diverted. At the very least, they will have an inferior driving experience.… Read More
Is Elon Musk from the Future?
One of the more annoying (ie. delightful) things about Tesla Motors is the way the company casually disrupts long established auto industry business models. Whether it is vehicle sales and service or overcoming EV range anxiety or using your car to as an extension of the power grid or letting your car drive itself.
The latest twist… Read More
Roger Rabbit Redux – Self-Driving Car Edition
With General Motors investing $500M in Lyft and buying Cruise Automation (aftermarket self-driving car technology) for $1B, there are some people speculating that the company may be recreating its mid-prior-century effort to monopolize mass transportation. In the 1940’s, National City Lines and Pacific City Lines,… Read More
Car Companies Confront Data Sharing
Senior OnStar executives have long intoned at industry events that the customer owns his or her data. The only problem is that the customer is only allowed glimpses of his or her data. They don’t have control of that data in spite of their so-called ownership of it.
It’s a complex challenge especially given the fact that… Read More
Guard Vehicles from Cyber Attacks!
Law enforcement officers, emergency responders and commercial fleet operators cannot afford to operate vehicles without the assurance of security. A police officer, emergency medical technician or truck driver cannot live with any uncertainty regarding the integrity of their vehicle’s safety systems and powertrain.
That… Read More
GM in the Middle of Mobility Muddle
General Motors has made a flurry of announcements around its Maven mobility brand for car sharing and its investment in Lyft. The latest news, first reported by re/code, is that Lyft and Maven will be rolling out a short-term rental program for Lyft drivers to use Chevy Equinoxes in Chicago later this month. The program is called … Read More
What the FBI is Saying about Connected Cars
The U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), in cooperation with the U.S. Department of Transportation, put out a written public service announcement (PSA) last week detailing the agency’s concerns regarding automotive cybersecurity and its recommendations for the driving and vehicle owning public. The PSA followed… Read More
Of Steering Wheels and Buggy Whips
At the heart of automated driving is control of the steering wheel, gas and brake pedals in the car. Based on NHTSA’s recently negotiated agreement with car makers, those selling cars in the U.S. will add automatic emergency braking to their cars by 2022. So it seems that we humans are already ceding control of the brake pedal.… Read More
The Data Crisis is Unfolding – Are We Ready?