Apple CarPlay and Android for R1T / R1S?

[yizzung]

I have a bunch of content on my phone ready for offline use. Music, podcasts, audio books from the public library. Yes, I can use bluetooth audio. If I don't have CarPlay, my phone will be mounted on a vent or the windshield so that I can switch from a podcast to a book or to my music. I won't be able to take advantage of the built-in charge pad because a mounted phone will be my only way, while driving, to "change the station" so to speak.

Today, Rivian has just Spotify. And I don't use Spotify.

We have a Panasonic smart TV that we bought circa 2011. At the time, it had a Hulu, Netflix, and YouTube app. One by one, each of those native apps got discontinued. Not even the streaming giants found it worthwhile to maintain different apps for each generation of a dozen's manufacturers different platforms.

Instead, we attach an Apple TV to the device (or a Fire stick, or whatever Google calls their thing). Magically, our 10-year-old TV is smart again.

Add support for AA/CP to a vehicle, and all of a sudden you have on-screen support for dozens upon dozens of apps, both mainstream and niche (like the one my public library uses for loaned audio books). In the AA/CP world, each developer adds automotive support in their own app. And Rivian expends only the resources to keep the AA/CP implementation up to date.

I'm not saying they shouldn't have a strong, smart infotainment offering that works completely even when you don't have your phone with you. They absolutely should. But I disagree that such an offering even has the potential to outshine the user experience of AA/CP which allows me to access and seamless witch between the content that's already on my phone using all my apps that are already logged in.

Many reviewers have mentioned that they feel this is one of Rivian's few misses. It's not just a bunch of crazies on a forum. Continue telling CS and your guide. When you get your vehicle (because for almost all of us complainers, it's not an actual dealbreaker) and you're using a phone mount and a USB cable rather than the charging pad, take a photo and tweet them about how annoying it is that you have to resort to such tacky measures in such a nice car because they refused to implement AA/CP. That is probably the single most effective thing you can do to get them to change course.

You’re kinda making the point of exactly why the auto makers don’t want to give away the farm to Apple/Google. Your tv is just a dumb box and all the data (and revenue potential) flows through Roku/Google/Apple. (Panasonic BTW has a market cap lower than Roku.)

Roku also now makes TVs. Apple/Google/Roku get a treasure trove of monetizable data from our living rooms and Panasonic gets zero.

Car makers would love to sell you XM or Spotify or car insurance, and having the data enables future earnings otherwise not achievable if they’re just selling doors and tires and windshields. Dumb boxes on wheels.

Rivian is neither dumb nor tone deaf. They know what’s going to butter their bread. Whether or not they can offer a solution that’s competitive with AA/CP remains to be seen.

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[yizzung]

As a current AA/CP user, I too find them to be great and vastly superior to the crap that was in cars before. But decision is about $ and there's a lot of it on the table. I've seen estimated the life-time value of a car customer at $500K (future purchases, financing, maintenance, insurance, tents, etc.) and that figure could be too low if the Tesla model proves out (solar panels, batteries, rides on SpaceX rockets, etc.)

Giving away the interface and, more importantly, the data to Apple/Google will produce for automakers the same fate experienced in mobile phones and televisions. Would you rather own stock in Google or Nokia? Would you rather own stock in Roku or Panasonic? These great interfaces are "free" to consumers (which is why so many here love them) and they are hugely costly to the slow, sleepy manufacturing companies that allow them into the henhouse.

Ford, for example, has fought to keep Google out of the cockpit forever but has so much leverage given the volume of cars that it can negotiate more favorable terms (i.e. Ford gets to keep some control over the interface and gets to monetize the data rather than pissing it all away). Rivian, currently selling about 15 cars per day LOL, has no such leverage.

Rivian is being valued today more like Tesla (or Google or Apple) than like Panasonic or Nokia, which have been reduced to selling dumb boxes. And Rivian has told investors that they should be valued as such, based on big future plans. They are not going to capitulate on this point just because people like these interfaces -- if they do, the whole business model starts to fall apart. They don't want to manufacture dumb boxes.

 

[yizzung]

As a current AA/CP user, I too find them to be great and vastly superior to the crap that was in cars before. But decision is about $ and there's a lot of it on the table. I've seen estimated the life-time value of a car customer at $500K (future purchases, financing, maintenance, insurance, tents, etc.) and that figure could be too low if the Tesla model proves out (solar panels, batteries, rides on SpaceX rockets, etc.)

Giving away the interface and, more importantly, the data to Apple/Google will produce for automakers the same fate experienced in mobile phones and televisions. Would you rather own stock in Google or Nokia? Would you rather own stock in Roku or Panasonic? These great interfaces are "free" to consumers (which is why so many here love them) and they are hugely costly to the slow, sleepy manufacturing companies that allow them into the henhouse.

Ford, for example, has fought to keep Google out of the cockpit forever but has so much leverage given the volume of cars that it can negotiate more favorable terms (i.e. Ford gets to keep some control over the interface and gets to monetize the data rather than pissing it all away). Rivian, currently selling about 15 cars per day LOL, has no such leverage.

Rivian is being valued today more like Tesla (or Google or Apple) than like Panasonic or Nokia, which have been reduced to selling dumb boxes. And Rivian has told investors that they should be valued as such, based on big future plans. They are not going to capitulate on this point just because people like these interfaces -- if they do, the whole business model starts to fall apart. They don't want to manufacture dumb boxes.

I should clarify that I'm just speculating. I have no clue what Rivian's motivation is, but this makes most logical sense to me. I've never worked for Google or Apple or Amazon but I did work at two other household name tech companies, so I have an inkling about what might be happening behind the scenes...

 

[Rivian_Hugh_III]

Your argument goes right out the window with the integration of Amazon Alexa.

Nope, because Amazon is not building a car. Thus the sweetheart deal.

 

[CommodoreAmiga]

Nope, because Amazon is not building a car. Thus the sweetheart deal.

I don't agree with your premise... but to play along for a moment: What car is Google building? Don't say Waymo, because I don't think that's ever been intended as a vehicle (product) that people buy/own.

 

[jtshaw]

I seem to be in the minority here, but I have a car with CP/AA and a Tesla and the CP/AA experience is awful in comparison. It’s so bad in fact, neither my wife or I bother to use it most of the time.

Apps don’t work consistently. What you can do with voice vs touch isn’t consistent. The UX itself is scaled in a lowest common denominator sort of way. It only feels like a win because the previous systems were even worse garbage.

 

[hola29]

I have been using carplay since launch, use it every day that I drive in the car. That said, the UI, just in my opinion, is simplistic and at times frustrating. They have to deal w/ many cars, including small screens...if they could use a large hi-res screen, Car Play would likely be a whole lot different/better...Carplay is a giant compromise, Rvian hopefully can do a whole lot better owning the whole ecosystem...oh wait, Apple did that...and had some slight success Lol...

 

[Rivian_Hugh_III]

I don't agree with your premise... but to play along for a moment: What car is Google building? Don't say Waymo, because I don't think that's ever been intended as a vehicle (product) that people buy/own.

I fold. I’ve got a pair of sixes. What you got?

 

[CommodoreAmiga]

I fold. I’ve got a pair of sixes. What you got?

Paper clip and a stick of gum.

 

[astonius]

Reiterated for the third time with customer support today that lack of CarPlay is the only thing that has me on the fence with regards to following through with my preorder. I think those of us who really like and want CarPlay should continue to speak up about it.

I think the naysayers are wrong about a couple of aspects. I don’t suspect Amazon is particularly hostile to CarPlay or Android Auto. They don’t have a competing product. Alexa is not a direct competitor to these platforms. Relevant Amazon apps are compatible with CP/AA today. Amazon happily sells Apple products, and they just recently released a Prime Video app native to macOS. I don’t know where this idea that Amazon is the hold-up originates, but it seems specious.

The CarPlay interface itself is not the killer feature. It’s the tight integration with the device, software, and services that we already use frequently that makes it special. We have a familiar experience no matter the setting and access to the apps and services we want to use, not those dictated by the platform.

If Rivian’s infotainment system was an open platform which allowed third-party applications to be developed and installed then that might be a fair compromise, but without this we are at the mercy of Rivian to develop and release software specific to their system that supports the services we want to use, and it leaves a poor, anti-choice taste in my mouth that Rivian has chosen to dictate which services I must use (Spotify or TuneIn) to get the full experience within the vehicle rather than a service I already have and use every day via CarPlay (Apple Music). I will not switch to Spotify.

 

[jtshaw]

Reiterated for the third time with customer support today that lack of CarPlay is the only thing that has me on the fence with regards to following through with my preorder. I think those of us who really like and want CarPlay should continue to speak up about it.

I think the naysayers are wrong about a couple of aspects. I don’t suspect Amazon is particularly hostile to CarPlay or Android Auto. They don’t have a competing product. Alexa is not a direct competitor to these platforms. Relevant Amazon apps are compatible with CP/AA today. Amazon happily sells Apple products, and they just recently released a Prime Video app native to macOS. I don’t know where this idea that Amazon is the hold-up originates, but it seems specious.

The CarPlay interface itself is not the killer feature. It’s the tight integration with the device, software, and services that we already use frequently that makes it special. We have a familiar experience no matter the setting and access to the apps and services we want to use, not those dictated by the platform.

If Rivian’s infotainment system was an open platform which allowed third-party applications to be developed and installed then that might be a fair compromise, but without this we are at the mercy of Rivian to develop and release software specific to their system that supports the services we want to use, and it leaves a poor, anti-choice taste in my mouth that Rivian has chosen to dictate which services I must use (Spotify or TuneIn) to get the full experience within the vehicle rather than a service I already have and use every day via CarPlay (Apple Music). I will not switch to Spotify.

I’d second all of this. I know Amazon has some agreements about van production as referenced in the S1 filling. They don’t control Rivian product decisions though. That is simply not how any of this works…

 

[chopsui]

The CarPlay interface itself is not the killer feature. It’s the tight integration with the device

Mostly agree except for this part. The killer feature of AA/CarPlay is not having to pay for yet another subscription for services that are otherwise available for free (or already paid for in a different subscription on your phone!).

I'm tired of being nickel and dimed to death by subscription models and I suspect so are most other people. At some point, the resentment such practices create will come back to bite corporations on the ass. (I hope)

 

[fotoflux]

Tesla is planning to offer a subscription to its autonomous driving feature, but they also apparently will allow you to pay up front for it for $10,000 or whatever the going rate is today. I'm the type of person that would rather pay up front, but if the subscription cost is low enough that I'd pay less than $10,000 over 5-8 years, I'd pay for the subscription because I will save no money by paying $10,000 up front every time I buy a new car...

Subscriptions tend to make companies more money because people tend to be ok to spend $50/mo instead of a huge up front cost. So more people opt-in. In cases like Tesla where the up-front cost is extremely high, the company probably makes more money by offering a subscription to a much larger market than they would by only charging an up-front cost to a much smaller market. Consumers end up paying less because they only pay for the subscription while they use it instead of paying a fixed up-front cost. So really they're not the worst thing in the world.

 

[2021R1T]

The major benefit of CarPlay is moving from vehicle to vehicle seamlessly with "my" preferred interface and information. I also like a single charge regardless of what I am driving including rental cars.

 

[Obioban]

I won't buy the truck if they don't add non subscription wireless carplay.

Carplay means two things to me:
1) I don't need to pay for a monthly data plan for my car, to use any internet features.
2) a decade (+-) from now, with Rivian stops sending updates out for the nav, the feature set on the nav will remain up to date.

I buy cars and keep them for a long time, and tend to have 5-6 of them. I refuse to pay for a data plan for each car, and nothing dates a car faster than an obsolete ICE setup (which carplay avoids).

Plus, even today it doesn't have the features I want-- Apple Music and Waze for nav/police alerts .

So, if they won't add it, I'll just wait for a truck that does. AFAIK, Tesla is the ONLY company out there not offering CarPlay. Not coincidentally, I've never owned a Tesla and currently have no intention to.

Meanwhile, my 20 year old M5 and 15 year old M3s (purchased new) have wireless Carplay, giving me every ICE feature I actually care about in modern cars

No carplay guarantees tech obsolescence and means you have to pay a monthly data plan (once the free included period is over). To me, that is unacceptable.

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