Modern cars are laden down with all sorts of connected features. Remote start via cell phone, data connections for built-in apps, cars are increasingly reliant on mobile networks for full functionality — mobile networks that can, and eventually will, shut down. When those systems go dark, what happens to the cars?
Wired looked into the issue, and found that owners of older cars are often just left out in the cold. Volkswagen, Hyundai, Nissan, and more have all had cars lose functionality when cell networks changed — often without owners getting any alternative. From Wired:
The 3G sunset left drivers of some Volkswagens, including a handful of models built between 2014 and 2019, unable to access Volkswagen’s Car-Net service. Car-Net includes remote start, but also automated service notifications, emergency assistance, antitheft alerts, and remote automatic crash notifications, among other network-enabled features.
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Volkswagen is far from the only automaker to have its software ambitions outrun its hardware and infrastructure realties. Vehicles from Hyundai and Nissan, some as late as model year 2019, also lost some features after 2022’s 3G sunset. (Other vehicles, including some built by General Motors and Stellantis, were eligible for presunset upgrades or aftermarket solutions.)
Just this year, some 3,000 Nissan Leaf owners in the United Kingdom were notified by the company that they would lose access to connected services and a related app after the nation shut down its 2G network.
The issue, at its core, comes down to the idea of the “software-defined vehicle” — a profit play from automakers who want to get in on all those sweet sweet subscription fees that tech companies charge. By building features in software, rather than hardware, they can be modified, updated, or charged for at any time. At least, as long as the car is supported. From Wired:
But for how long? Today’s phones are able to receive updates six to eight years after their purchase date. Samsung and Google provide Android OS updates and security updates for seven years. Apple halts servicing products seven years after they stop selling them.
That might not cut it in the auto world, where the average age of cars on US roads is only going up. A recent report found that cars and trucks just reached a new record average age of 12.6 years, up two months from 2023. That means the car software hitting the road today needs to work—and maybe even improve—beyond 2036. The average length of smartphone ownership is just 2.8 years.
The folks behind these vehicles outright admit that the goal here is to generate income without having to spend on physical features of new cars. TechCrunch talked about it earlier this year:
Automakers are throwing billions of dollars into the software-defined vehicle effort in hopes of getting some return on that investment. Once unique to Tesla, built-in tablets now look pretty ordinary on new car and truck dashboards, and major automakers are gradually embracing over-the-air updates (albeit many have limited capability), driver-assist software and specialized app stores. As CES reminds us each year, basically everything is getting “smart” anyways — phones, TVs, watches, refrigerators and so on. A similar phenomenon is happening with cars, too; it’s just happening slower, in part because cars have way more moving parts than, say, a smart thermostat.
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As high prices push folks to keep vehicles longer, car companies want to make up for selling fewer cars by charging software subscription fees. GM, for example, wants its services revenue to top $25 billion per year by 2030, while Stellantis set its bar just slightly lower — $22.5 billion by the end of the decade. This isn’t quite Apple territory — the company’s services business brings in about that much in a single quarter. But still, these automakers aim to make a ton of revenue from software and related services.
Next time you’re in the market for a used car, pay attention to the services it offered when it was new. It may take some research to figure out what infrastructure those features rely on, and whether there’s still support from all parties involved — and whether that support will be sticking around for the duration of your time with the car. Or, take the extra time, and find yourself a car with real actual buttons.