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Based on how the auto industry and artificial intelligence technology was going, anyone who knew anything would have already expected that future cars would have onboard smart assistants on top of driverless features. The latter issue has been practically normal throughout the course of 2016, but now, Microsoft is about to bring the former matter to life since vehicles by Nissan and BMW will feature the smart assistant Cortana.
Auto shows are supposed to be the venues where new car features, technologies, and innovations are shown, but it would seem that the first batch of auto additions for the year will be showcased at the 2017 CES. As part of its presentation, Microsoft announced that it will be offering bundles that include Cortana in order to provide cars with their very own smart assistant, PC World reports.
Technically, this offer is available for any car company to take advantage of, but only Nissan and BMW have jumped onboard for now. The bundle will include more than just the Halo franchise inspired AI, however, as the IoT hub Azure and Microsoft Dynamics are also part of the package.
Looking at the tech giant’s past choices, this move is fairly typical of Microsoft. It offers its products and services as bundles, introduces them into fields that aren’t typically associated with such things, and then kicking off a trend that everyone else follows.
As The Verge notes, the onboard Cortana feature functions a lot like a typical personal assistant in a digital framework. It’s able to tell users what their schedule entails, remark upon potential shortcuts on the roads, and even respond to certain vocal commands. Cortana could even make suggestions with regards to some of the vehicle’s functionality such as engaging the car’s auto-park feature.
Right now, the number of vehicles by the two companies to sport the bundle will be limited, likely to see just how profitable such offers will be. Inevitably, however, smart assistants and autonomous driving are predicted by experts to become the norm regardless which product or company is used.
