Last week, Mercedes-Benz held a particular occasion masking the way forward for Mercedes vehicles and automobiles altogether. Mercedes-Benz is likely one of the nice automotive producers on the planet. Famous for high quality, efficiency, design, and know-how, Mercedes usually stands above its friends. While many within the U.S. consider Henry Ford created the primary car, it was really Karl Benz of Mercedes-Benz who did so.
I’ve owned two Mercedes and ended up regretting each purchases and swearing by no means to purchase one other. But now, after listening to what Mercedes introduced, I feel it’s time to rethink that place as a result of what I heard probably addresses each issues I’ve had with the corporate. These points had little to do with the vehicles themselves (which had been superior) however all the pieces to do with my relationship with the corporate.
Along with Nvidia and Google, Mercedes-Benz is about to create a really good automotive that will preserve the connection with the automotive proprietor and probably be a much more pleasant front-end to the corporate than folks at present are. It guarantees a relationship along with your car that’s extra like a relationship with a well-trained pet and will evolve right into a long-term friendship.
Let’s discuss how automotive AI ought to enhance {our relationships} with our vehicles and their producers. Then we’ll shut with my Product of the Week, a prototype automotive from Audi, one other Nvidia accomplice, that guarantees extra wonderful advances.
My Weird Mercedes-Benz Relationship
My two Mercedes-Benz vehicles had been wonderful in their very own methods. The first was an ML 320, one of many first Mercedes vehicles made within the U.S., and, fortunately, it was a tank. While I owned the automotive, I used to be in three accidents, none of which had been my fault. In the third accident, I used to be between two brand-new Jeeps once I was hit by a dashing Mazda RX-7 whereas at a stoplight. The influence was sufficient to whole the 2 Jeeps, however my truck solely wanted two bumpers repaired.
The downside that arose had nothing to do with my truck. Instead, the issue needed to do with the service advisor to whom I used to be assigned, who clearly believed I used to be too poor and low-class to personal a Mercedes-Benz, one thing they made clear each time I got here in for service. That expertise soured me on the model though it was a seller relationship downside and had nothing to do with the automotive itself.
My second Mercedes, a GLA 45 AMG, was more moderen and likewise a implausible automotive. It was tremendous highly effective and, with one exception, one of the best observe automotive I’d ever owned. But a number of issues occurred that soured me on Mercedes-Benz once more.

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There was one choice I made positive I ordered as a result of it was necessary to me: the HomeLink storage door management. But between the time I ordered the automotive and when it arrived, the corporate had put that choice in a bundle that didn’t exist on the time of ordering. They deleted the choice with out notifying me.
When the automotive arrived with out it, I used to be supplied the possibility to have it put in by service at almost 10 occasions the preliminary value at ordering. All of this was on high of getting to choose up the automotive in Germany and being handled so poorly in the course of the course of that I almost returned the automotive and requested for my a refund.
An further downside was that the automotive had an computerized parking brake. This is problematic for a observe automotive as a result of once you cease and switch the automotive off, the brake units, however after a observe run when the brakes are white scorching, this may trigger the brake pads to stick to the rotors, requiring a brake job which isn’t low-cost, and the automotive will drive badly except that’s completed.
AMG had a month-to-month occasion the place you can name in and ask questions. When I known as in to ask about this brake downside, I used to be once more handled very poorly with the implication that I ought to simply suck it up and sit within the automotive with it working till the brakes cooled off (15-20 minutes) as there was not, and by no means can be, a workaround.
In each instances, it wasn’t the automotive’s fault however the folks at Mercedes-Benz who simply didn’t appear to take buyer look after a luxurious automotive severely. While my unhealthy experiences had been with Mercedes-Benz, I’ve identified individuals who have complained about each luxurious car, with the doable exception of Rolls-Royce.
Rather than having to take care of folks, what in case your automotive was clever sufficient to turn into your interface to the corporate? It may customise itself to your distinctive wants and even probably act proactively to avoid wasting your life.
The Next Generation of Smart Mercedes-Benz Cars
I consider myself as a automotive man. Like a lot of you, I anthropomorphize my automobiles, although not as a lot now as I did once I was younger. Up till this subsequent technology, vehicles haven’t been clever and have been moderately disappointing mates.
With Nvidia and Google within the combine, Mercedes-Benz is utilizing applied sciences like generative AI and Nvidia’s Omniverse to make vehicles smarter, vehicles that may speak to you and talk extra exactly what they want, report when repairs are poorly completed and advocate for you with Mercedes in a powerful effort to make you extra loyal to the model and extra engaged along with your more and more autonomous car.
From how next-generation factories are created to how the vehicles are constructed, Nvidia’s Omniverse might be used to simulate the manufacturing facility, the car, the strains of various fashions, and the robots and workers that can construct and preserve them.

You ought to have the ability to observe the automotive much better from once you order it to once you obtain it and get well timed notices if packages change, and you want to regulate your order to make sure what you wished is on the automotive or to include choices that will have been made obtainable after you ordered the automotive.
If the automotive has an issue, moderately than having to seek out the guide or name the dealership, the car will more and more have the ability to clarify the scenario and what you want to do to appropriate it. This final may very well be extremely necessary when you’ve got that downside tons of of miles from a dealership.
Entertainment, driving choices, seating, ambient lighting, and therapeutic massage seats might be set to your preferences when the automotive identifies you — which may very well be completed by means of your cellphone. Those settings will doubtless have the ability to transfer from automotive to automotive should you stick with the Mercedes-Benz model.
The vehicles could have sport consoles and be more and more capable of drive themselves, providing you with the time to make use of a bunch of leisure choices by means of the large show that takes up the entrance sprint. Think of the automotive as your rolling dwelling theater/gaming chair that can chew up the time on lengthy journeys or hold you entertained and engaged when caught in visitors.
You ought to even have the ability to do video conferencing calls within the automotive sooner or later, enabling you to attend conferences earlier than you even get to the workplace (assuming you ever go to the workplace).
The total software of know-how ought to result in higher vehicles and decrease prices, which ought to translate to decrease costs, higher customer support, and a significantly better relationship with the automotive and the proprietor. But let’s shut with how this might have modified my two unhealthy experiences with Mercedes-Benz.
Wrapping Up: Automotive AI to the Rescue
With the ML 320 scenario I talked about earlier, with embedded AI, as an alternative of a foul expertise, it might go like this:
When I decide up the car, and I’m clearly upset with how I’ve been handled, the automotive acknowledges that I’m upset and asks, “what’s wrong?” I then clarify to the embedded generative AI I that the service advisor is treating my spouse and me poorly and that we’re very upset about it.
The subsequent factor I do know, I get a name from Mercedes-Benz indicating they’d deal with it. By the next day, I’ve a brand new service advisor and a suggestion to have espresso with the top of the seller’s service division, who tells me to name him if I’ve every other points.
Instead of not wanting a Mercedes-Benz, I’m now impressed with the extent of service and am extra loyal to the model consequently. I’m not blowing smoke right here. I as soon as performed a survey about Dell and Sony and located that though Sony made higher PCs than Dell on the time, folks had been much more loyal to Dell as a result of Dell handled them very nicely once they had an issue, and Sony didn’t.

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In the GLA 45 expertise, I might have been assured that HomeLink was put in on the automotive earlier than I acquired it, been capable of make the car conscious I used to be being handled poorly, and once more Mercedes would have been capable of nip the issue within the bud earlier than I soured on the model.
More importantly, the automotive would have been capable of self-fix the issue with the parking brake and report again to Mercedes-Benz in order that different observe drivers may have benefited from my suggestions.

Essentially, I might go from by no means once more wanting to purchase a Mercedes to by no means wanting to purchase the rest, which is the true profit. Customer churn is a large expense for any trade. For a automotive firm with the repute for high quality that Mercedes-Benz has, enchancment in buyer engagement and coaching may massively enhance perceived product high quality and buyer loyalty.
I count on folks will need the flexibility to take the persona that has developed of their previous Mercedes-Benz to a brand new automotive. Otherwise, they might get so connected to the car that they’ll by no means wish to do away with it.
I’ve been a fan of TV exhibits like “Knight Rider” and “My Mother the Car,” so I’m wanting ahead to the day once I can have a deeper relationship with my car.

The Audi Activesphere Concept
Rarely do vehicles make it from their prototype type to closing manufacturing, however one latest prototype caught my eye: the Audi activesphere idea.

Image Credit: Audi
I dwell in Bend, Oregon, the place the climate can go from sunny and heat to snowy and harmful in a single day. I like sports activities vehicles, and whereas my spouse’s Jaguar F-Type was scary-dangerous when it acquired chilly, it was additionally one of the vital enjoyable vehicles I’d ever owned.
What I would like is a automotive that embodies the idea of a sports activities automotive however can, on the push of a button, rework into an off-road car or broaden so I can use it for a Costco run or to take the bikes into the hills. Like Mercedes-Benz, Audi can be working with Nvidia to supply comparable capabilities to these I discussed above.
With top-level efficiency, observe functionality, and the flexibility to remodel into an off-road or pickup-truck-like car on the contact of a button (and even mechanically as circumstances change), Audi’s activesphere is designed for the place I dwell and the way I’d prefer to get pleasure from my subsequent car. Of course, it’s electrical — most the entire coming developments are in electrical vehicles solely because the automotive trade goes electrical.

The Audi activesphere idea captured my creativeness like no different automotive earlier than. It’s extraordinarily engaging, speaks to what I’m lacking in each automotive I personal, and options leisure and self-driving capabilities that I’ve at all times wished however have been unable to buy. The solely questions are whether or not I can afford it or whether or not I can afford to not.
Mercedes-Benz is showcasing the persona of the automotive I would need subsequent, and Audi is exhibiting the design that greatest meets my wants. Audi could actually have a mixture of the 2 that can seize my pockets. I’ve owned three Audis (two TTs and one S5 Cabriolet) and cherished each. The Activesphere may turn into my fourth, so it’s my Product of the Week.
The opinions expressed on this article are these of the creator and don’t essentially mirror the views of ECT News Network.