Over 24 Million Cars will be Fitted with Apple's CarPlay in 2019

LONDON--July 9, 2014: Earlier this year, several car OEMs announced that they would be releasing new cars installed with CarPlay capabilities, including Ford, BMW, Audi, Mercedes, Jaguar/Land Rover, Toyota, Nissan, and Volvo, with many others sure to follow. In fact, quite a storm is brewing in the car industry. With Apple on the scene, ABI Research asks what are the wider implications for the automotive industry and for drivers in the future?

“will my smartphone be compatible with my car?”

With so many supporting CarPlay, ABI Research forecasts that in 2019 over 24 million new cars will be fitted with CarPlay. As well as CarPlay, ABI Research believes that the uptake of MirrorLink will also be fairly significant but predicts that more cars will be fitted with CarPlay. In addition to CarPlay, earlier this year Google also announced it would start an Open Automotive Alliance (OAA) and its standard will be known as “Android Auto”.

Without an open ecosystem, car makers could be forced to collaborate with more than one partner. This trend is concerning as car manufacturers will worry about incompatibility and whether supporting the wrong platform will lead to lost sales. For consumers potentially it could mean asking the dealer “will my smartphone be compatible with my car?”

MirrorLink, OAA, and GENIVI have all positioned themselves as “open sourced” and they could be considered competitors, which goes against being open. Despite the fact that Android Auto has only just been launched, it claims that it already has the backing of 40 car makers and as early as next year we should expect announcements. With this in mind, by 2019, uptake of the Android Auto standard could be more aggressive than CarPlay. Filomena Berardi, senior analyst summed up her thoughts; “Many believe Apple is creating further fragmentations and a ripple effect in the industry by not being open. However, love it or hate it, with Apple on the scene it certainly draws greater attention to in-car apps and now with the Android Auto standard on the scene both will certainly drive adoption of in-car apps.”

These findings are part of ABI Research’s Automotive Infotainment Market Research Automotive Infotainment.