Ford-Google Partnership: Google Extends Its Automotive Reach Wider and Deeper

A February announcement saw Google add Ford to their growing list of Original Equipment Manufacturers (OEMs) that have opted for the Android Automotive solution to meet the needs of their next generation of infotainment. After Renault-Nissan first took the plunge into Google’s automotive-tailored embedded solution in 2018, Google has gained rapid traction, particularly in the automotive mass market, with OEMs such as GM, FCA Group, Groupe PSA, and Volvo opting to bring Google onto the embedded side.

In the space of only three years, Google has wrapped up an impressive number of OEMs representing over 28 million vehicle sales by the end of 2019. While the pace of Android Automotive’s rollout is remarkable, not every implementation has been of the same “depth.” While Volvo has opted to pair the Android Automotive Operating System (OS) with Google’s connected services, including Google Maps and the Google Assistant, FCA will pair the embedded Android Automotive OS with a navigation experience powered by TomTom and Amazon’s Alexa intelligent voice assistant. Of all the OEM deals that Google has secured in the past three years, none has the depth of the Ford-Google partnership.

On top of the embedded Android Automotive OS, Ford will also source the following infotainment technologies and capabilities from Google:

• Google Automotive Services (GAS): This is a suite of automotive services that has been developed by Google with the constraints of the automotive environment in mind. These include Google Maps, Google’s intelligent voice assistant, and the Google Play Store. This will enable consumers to access familiar apps through the vehicle’s human-machine interface, delivering a more consistent digital experience with the outside world.
• Google Cloud: Ford will use the Google Cloud Platform to improve connected services development and orchestration, leveraging Google’s expertise in artificial intelligence and machine learning to develop new data-driven services, with personalization and maintenance-related services (prognostics and remote diagnostics) as the main focus areas. This represents a major coup for Google Cloud, which has thus far lagged behind Microsoft Azure and AWS in the automotive market.
• Team Upshift: As well as leveraging Google’s platforms and development environments, Ford and Google will combine their efforts in the form of a collaborative innovation group featuring engineers from both companies. This represents a step change in Google’s relationship with devices. Historically, Google has rarely committed new engineering effort for device OEMs that use Google’s OS and services. Supplying engineering expertise in support of the development of unique services allows Google to provide the host with standard GAS services, providing a uniform digital experience to the consumer, while also providing the OEM with the confidence of a differentiated, branded experience.

For most OEMs opting for the Android Automotive OS, there has been little to lose in terms of the status quo. In contrast, Ford SYNC was among the oldest and most mature homegrown infotainment experiences in the mass market. By selecting Google from a platform, connected services, and engineering services perspectives, Ford has done away with a considerable legacy in favor of a radically new way of engaging with a player previously considered a threat to the automotive industry.

Infotainment experts interviewed by ABI Research emphasize the relative flexibility of Google’s approach to automotive, with the Android Automotive OS featuring the necessary application programming interfaces to allow OEMs to pair Google’s embedded OS with third-party services. In short, this means that an OEM would not incur Huawei-levels of engineering effort to build their own services or would not need bring in third-party services on top of the embedded Android Automotive OS. In the future, a major avenue of differentiation among OEMs will therefore be at the connected services level, with legacy automotive telematics and connected services suppliers competing with each other and with GAS and other third-party services made available to the consumer via the Google play store. A major advantage that Google has is the ability to provide consistency, a uniform in-vehicle digital experience that gels with the remainder of the consumer’s digital life. Now Google is introducing the potential for bespoke and unique services to OEMs through “Team Upshift”–type engagements that will add OEM brand differentiation on top of the consistent digital experience. In essence, Google is behaving more like an automotive supplier than ever before and is therefore increasing the threat it poses to automotive incumbents.