Quote:
Originally Posted by Soussef24
Even if you are right that this is the mainstream reasoning among car manufacturers' marketing departments and mainly the German ones. I do not agree this approach/strategy makes sense (anymore) and think it will quickly stop to be sustainable.
You cannot expect customers to switch cars because of a small operating system update at the HU level. Most of customers don't care and don't notice those changes when an LCI passes by. And for most of those customers who notice those changes, they are only frustrated that the manufacturer expects them to upgrade to the newer model and lose a great amount of money through devaluation...
Today, everybody is used to OTA software updates, and manufacturers like Tesla push the model to a great extent which is really to the benefit of the customers. With this approach, my opinion is that the brand would benefit much more from customer satisfaction and turn it into customer loyalty! Especially that, the value of moving from ID6 to ID7 isn't huge, but it's a nice have that customers would be sensitive to.
Moreover if you look at how BMW (and other traditional manufacturer) build their cars and options, it is a nightmare of logistic, part numbers, manufacturing processes, etc. Which makes the options far more expensive than what they are really worth... Look at the different levels (at least five if I recall) of Park Assist that BMW has, each with different hardware and control units, and mix that with the different aesthetic options (for instance side mirror cameras with glossy black plastic covers or mate plastic), then with different generations and year models, and it quickly turn into a nightmare that probably costs more than the option itself.
If you compare that to the fact that Tesla decided for their Model 3 to put additional battery capacity built-in, and activate it over the air, if the customer pays for the option, you understand how behind the curve traditional car makers really are!
|
While I personally don't disagree that updating the same car is what *I* would want, I think this misses that about one-third of new car transactions (at least in the US) are leases. And that number is growing. We're also seeing the initial success of car subscription and car-sharing services where you don't have the same car for your term or even just pay-per-use from a fleet. Traditional auto ownership is very much separating from the asset ownership model of the past.
The constantly changing tech reinforces that trend by encouraging people to stay in the lease cycle in order to get new hardware and tech every 2-3 years. Downstream, this also supplies the pre-owned market with a bunch of 2-3 year-old vehicles, with that supply driving down costs to obtain those preowned cars and encouraging even the used car market to move toward vehicles that are only 2-3 years old vs. 4-5 or more.
End result is you have more churn throughout the industry - new car lessees are getting a new car every 2 years, and used car purchasers have their pick of newer pre-owneds to cycle through faster as well. All of this keeps production #s up year to year and the money flowing through the entire food chain.