In 2011, amid one of the Cadillac brand’s many reboots, General Motors introduced the Cadillac User Experience to its then-latest generation of luxury sedans and SUVs. CUE was a touchscreen infotainment suite, smartphone integration system, and a capacitive touch panel on the dashboard that used haptic feedback in place of physical buttons. It was an utter disaster. Reviewers at the time, as well as owners, panned CUE’s unresponsiveness, bizarre menu layouts and lag.
Then again, the average new EV costs around $65,000; who’s buying such an expensive, high-tech vehicle and doesn’t own a smartphone? I’d love to talk to that person if they exist. Ultimately, however, this is about control. Whether drivers want it or not — and I suspect a great many do not — this next generation of cars will be about consumer data and subscription features as much as they’ll be about instant electric torque and eliminating carbon emissions.