Automotive Intellect Blog

It’s no surprise that electrification and connectivity were hot topics at CES this year. But there are usually a few key technologies that simmer just below the surface. We met with a mix of investors, customers, partners and suppliers who came to visit us at the Visteon booth across mobility segments like automotive, commercial vehicles and two-wheelers. From these conversations, five key takeaways emerged as top priorities for our digital cockpit product portfolio.

Esthetics Combined with Technology Create Differentiation

Automotive interior designers were primarily interested in display geometry and esthetics. For example, our Command & Control Display comes in an attractive, curved and unique shape. One side is a little larger and taller than the other. When you’re not using the bottom part of the display, it disappears, blends with the background and almost looks like a piece of furniture. And then when your finger gets close to it, the buttons light up, and you see that it’s part of the screen that you can touch and interact with. Those types of products are beneficial for stylists to see, so they know where the industry is headed and how the vehicle style could complement it.

Image Quality Doesn’t Always Mean More Expensive

Visitors were very impressed with the image quality of our display products, and we demonstrated this through differentiating technologies like TrueColor Image Enhancement for improved sunlight readability and Active Privacy for improved driver safety. We use an innovative combination of hardware and software. This allows us to improve the image quality of traditional displays. The result? They look impressively similar to the more expensive organic light-emitting diode (OLED) displays.

OEMs Want Their Own App Stores

Many visitors were very interested in our AllGo AppStore and associated connected services. OEMs that offer their own app stores can provide customers with customization and personalization. This offers a distinct advantage when tailoring it to the region, vehicle segment or vehicle use case. We demonstrated that our app store is flexible and scalable and includes popular apps for drivers, thanks to our established partnerships with major app companies.

Safety Features Offer a Wide Range of Applications

We showcased a safety feature that uses existing cameras to give a bird’s-eye view around the vehicle. It works by stitching the camera images together. This feature also comes with a phone app.
With the app, users can connect to the vehicle and even talk to the driver. We built this feature primarily for passenger vehicles to increase the safety of the driver, passengers and the vehicle itself for theft protection. Talking to customers at the event, we discovered exciting possibilities for commercial vehicles and heavy-duty applications too!

Integrated Solutions Enable Enhanced Functionality

Standalone entertainment or clusters don’t get much attention anymore. Even at more cost-sensitive segments like two-wheeler applications, automakers were interested in larger displays powered by integrated electronics. Larger or pillar-to-pillar screens with all the additional functionalities are top-of-mind for premium passenger car segments.

One example of this is our SmartCore™ cockpit domain controller software. It allows you to split the infotainment screen into multiple sections, giving the driver or the passenger the ability to dynamically adjust the size of each section with a simple finger slide. You can also move widgets and content freely between the central information screen, driver information screen, and passenger information screen.

It’s exciting to see what the future has in store for electrification and connectivity. Are you ready to be part of the revolution? Join our team!