Connected cars are not a thing of the future anymore as a slew of them are being launched in the global market. Amid the push for smarter cars, American car manufacturer Ford has announced that all its cars are going to run on Google’s Android operating system in 2023.
This means that Ford cars would not need to be retrofitted with hardware to run Android Auto and will be able to run software like Google Maps as well as other Android apps without the need for a smartphone.
Google partners with Ford
Ford’s top brass has said that the company is establishing a new collaborative group called Team Upshift where employees from both Google and Android will work together on this project.
“This may include projects ranging from modernizing our plants through vision AI, developing new retail experiences when buying a vehicle, creating new ownership offers based on connected vehicle data, and more,” McClelland said in a post.
“By leveraging Google Cloud, we’ll continue our digital transformation and power connected vehicle technologies with a trusted, secure and global cloud solution”.
Many more joining the race
Ford isn’t the only one partnering with Google. Other automakers like Volvo, General Motors and the Renault-Nissan-Mitsubishi Alliance have struck a deal with Google to use its software to power the vehicle infotainment services.
In addition to the Google Play ecosystem, Ford and third-party developers will work to create more Android applications for the automobile ecosystem to improve and more personalize the ownership experience.
Other projects
The company has also said that it will divert a significant part of its engineering talent from operating system development to customer innovations
“Teaming up with Google allows us to accelerate our ability to challenge our current ownership model and deploy new business models to capture recurring revenue and profit from software, data and connected ecosystems,” McClelland said.
At the moment most of the automobile manufacturers are using custom user interfaces for their own cars and allow users the option of Android Auto and Apple CarPlay as third-party smartphone connectivity software.
