self driving impact on sporty car brands

[peet365]

I am thinking about impact of self driving on sporty car brands. IMO self driving takes away all the advantage from sporty brands like BMW or Tesla.
With self driving advantage of quick acceleration, superior handling and immediate reaction to accelerator is diminishing.
Self driving to me is more about comfortable than sporty and this IMO will take away the big advantage Tesla, which is trying to position itself as sporty brand. Electric drive train is much better for comfortable drive than ICE, but in 10-15 years when self driving will be a mainstream thing, EV will be also mainstream, so no big advantage for Tesla here.
Anyone thought about it the same way?

 

[RobStark]

"Sporty" brands will have the same advantages as they do now.

People that see vehicles as transportation appliances will continue to buy Camry type autonomous vehicles and engage autonomous drive 100% of the time.

People that enjoy driving don't enjoy bumper to bumper traffic.

When in slow moving frustrating traffic Tesla Performance Dual Motor owners will engage autonomous drive and surf the internet or whatever.

When the road is open then Tesla Performance Dual Motor owners will take control of the car themselves.

Much like 98% of people that buy SUVs never go off roading but want to be seen as the adventurous type of person that goes off roading my guess is that in the future many people that hate driving will want to be seen as the cool person that enjoys driving. And make car buying decisions accordingly.

Expecting consumers to act like highly intelligent rational self maximizers has rarely proven effective for marketers.

As urbanization has grown the number of people not getting a drivers license has grown. The percentage of US adults getting drivers license has been dropping slowly but steadily since 1983. It is nothing new. But the raw number of US adults having licenses continues to grow.


Autonomous drive is not going to stop people that enjoy driving from buying cars that are enjoyable to drive.

Autonomous drive is going to get people that hate driving that are using subways,taxis, buses and private car services but can afford a car into autonomous cars.

Even in progressive places like California governments are putting the brakes on autonomous drive vehicles. California is requiring autonomous cars to have steering wheels,brakes,and accelerator pedals in addition to licensed drivers to not only have standard driver license but autonomous drive vehicle certificates. It will be a very very long time if ever when governments ban humans from driving cars.

 

[peet365]

Of course I am not talking about 3-5 years, but about 10-15 years and that will be the time when cars without driving wheels will be sold. I know 10-15 years is a long time, but also Tesla valuation is based more on future prospect than on 2016-2017 expectations.
If car is sold without driving wheel what advantage has sporty brand? I think it will be more about comfort, luxury and in car entertainment.

 

[uselesslogin]

If car is sold without driving wheel what advantage has sporty brand? I think it will be more about comfort, luxury and in car entertainment.

Can't the sporty brand continue to make cars with comfort and luxury and fancy convenience features? Then we would call it a premium brand. Wait, isn't Tesla already a premium brand? In any event the game is far different when they sell cars without steering wheels. For example I can't see our family having more than one car. We'd have one car that we leave stuff in to go do all the family stuff and road trips but for me getting to work I would just use a shared fleet.

 

[peet365]

Wait, isn't Tesla already a premium brand? In any event the game is far different when they sell cars without steering wheels.

Not sure if Tesla is a premium brand in terms of luxury. Model S to me is a sport sedan with much more emphases on sporty than luxury - but judging by sales results obviously market is much more keen on sporty than luxury right now
Not saying that Tesla can’t do it, but some of Tesla´s biggest advantages will be not as important as they are right now. They can certainly be better than big car companies in incar entertainment and it is quite obvious that they will not lose by coming late with self driving technology to the market:smile: Time will tell if they can be better than Apple or Google in infotainment, but as you said, it will be different game and company which will be able to adjust to completely new situation will survive. From that point of view not sure if insourcing of things like seats will not hinder the flexibility, but on the other hand, seats for self driving will be different than seats for driving and probably will be big part of offering in the future.
I think that Apple and Google will give Tesla much harder times in the future than current competition, but market is so huge that those 3 companies will be very well off just by eating BMW´s and Mercedes´ and then Toyota´s GM´s and VW´s lunch for many years to come.

 

[RobStark]

Of course I am not talking about 3-5 years, but about 10-15 years and that will be the time when cars without driving wheels will be sold. I know 10-15 years is a long time, but also Tesla valuation is based more on future prospect than on 2016-2017 expectations.
If car is sold without driving wheel what advantage has sporty brand? I think it will be more about comfort, luxury and in car entertainment.

I don't see a car being sold legally without a steering wheel in the next 20 years in a major market. And it might be never.

And I don't see a steering wheel being legally banned ever.

Allowing customers to take advantage of "sporty."