DataOne Software’s blog this year has emphasized the impact of increasing vehicle complexity within a wide swath of the automotive industry, and we are not going to be short on topics any time soon. The latest innovation that has captured the investment dollars of the tech sector, “AI” (which in truth is a mislabeling of the technology – it should more appropriately be called a Large Language Model) is now making its way into OEMs’ development plans, and automotive risk assessment professionals will need to closely consider its ramifications to avoid unexpected losses.
Read MoreDec 5 2023
Topics: Insurance, Automotive Technology, AI
Nov 28 2023
The economic conditions of the early 2020s had a unique impact on the automotive industry. Dubbed trimflation by car culture website Autopian, the output in entry-level models was greatly reduced, while high-margin trims became more commonplace and MSRPs were increased across the board. UMass Amherst Professor Isabella Weber noted, “Companies in the automobile sector [amplified] price pressures enabled by a form of temporary monopoly granted by the computer chip shortages. This allowed car producers to focus on expensive models with higher margins and generally raise prices without having to fear a loss in market share.”
Read MoreTopics: VIN, Insurance, Risk Management
Nov 14 2023
Over-the-air (OTA) updates are a growing trend in the auto industry and are expected to be standardized across OEMs by 2028. While OTA updates will greatly benefit OEMs, saving 1.5 billion per year in recall services as well as improving the customer experience with fewer trips to the dealer, how will they impact the rest of the industry? This article addresses some of the unknowns that could potentially benefit or negatively impact the retailing, servicing, and insuring of vehicles in the future.
Read MoreTopics: Automotive Technology
Nov 9 2023
A successful transportation business in today’s fast-paced and competitive climate requires the most efficient and cost-effective business processes. Advances in vehicle technology, including advanced driver-assistance systems (ADAS), telematics, GPS tracking systems, and dash-cam tech have revolutionized the way these businesses operate with the ability to lower vehicle risks and better maintain their fleets. Here are four ways in which advanced vehicle technology is improving transportation businesses.
Read MoreTopics: Logistics, Automotive Technology, ADAS
Sep 14 2023
Electric Vehicle (EV) charging stations are a novelty right now, but in the United States, they will become both ubiquitous and a necessity in the next decade. The 2030 National Charging Grid Report finds 2.3 million charging ports will be needed to accommodate the 28 million EVs expected to be on the road by 2030, but as of right now, only 160,000 exist nationwide. This will be an enormously expensive venture – grid analytics company Kevala believes that California alone will need $50 billion to accommodate its EV and emissions targets.
Utility companies will have an unprecedented amount of financial capital, scope of work, and public pressure to adapt their service areas to the EV era. While not applicable to all the challenges inherent in this transition, curated, in-depth, and accurate vehicle data will be essential to develop optimal grid planning strategies.
Topics: Electric Vehicles
Aug 24 2023
Legendary physicist Marie Curie once said “I was taught that the way of progress was neither swift nor easy,” and the United States’ inevitable nationwide shift toward fully electrified vehicles (EVs) is the perfect example of that sentiment. Many states have set ambitious initial zero-emissions targets as early as 2025, which will require radical infrastructure change and an exponential increase in consumer EV adoption.
The Inflation Reduction Act, California’s Advanced Clean Cars standards (which are opted into by an additional 14 states), and other state initiatives are kickstarting that adoption by offering numerous rebates and discounted billing programs for EV owners. These programs will present unprecedented operational challenges for the utility companies tasked with implementing and managing them. These challenges include parsing and processing a massive influx of new data, inconsistencies within that data, and continual shifts in guidelines and regulations that need to be followed as both the government and auto industry landscape evolves. This article will outline the core benefits of ongoing access to in-depth, 17-digit VIN data in ensuring a sustainable, productive response to the US’ electric vehicle transition.
Read MoreTopics: Electric Vehicles
Jul 19 2023
Inflation has been outpacing wages for many years, which has created significant hardship for workers and forced them to extend the life of key necessities such as their personal vehicles. Kelley Blue Book (KBB) has found that the average vehicle life has now been extended to 12 and a half years, in an effort to avoid adding a new car payment to already strained budgets. Timely, cost-effective, and quality vehicle maintenance is necessary to attain this ambitious lifespan, and customers typically have many local options for servicing and repairs. The parts and services industry has become an enormous market ($137 billion in 2022 from dealerships alone) with intense competition, so how can these businesses generate the customer loyalty and positive experiences needed to thrive with repeat business and word-of-mouth recommendations?
Read MoreTopics: Parts & Services, Service Data
Jul 10 2023
In many cases, vehicle data and VIN decoding solutions are the foundation of your automotive product’s features and processes. You may have invested a great deal of effort to integrate with your current provider. Perhaps you've migrated to a different data provider in the past and have experience working through the headaches of disparate naming conventions and issues with style/vehicle IDs. You likely have a customer base that relies on you for progressive development and new features, as well as a busy road map ahead.
Read MoreTopics: VIN
Jun 26 2023
In previous articles of this ADAS blog series, we discussed the increasing prominence of ADAS and its impact across the auto industry, as well as some of the challenges with these advanced safety technologies. As ADAS systems continue to grow in their prominence, with a solid amount of data accumulated over the last few years to prove their efficacy, as well as their limitations, manufacturers are constantly looking for ways to improve these systems and prevent even more accidents.
This article includes some of the significant trends shaping the future of ADAS as the auto industry works to transform automotive safety and autonomous driving.
Read MoreTopics: Automotive Technology, ADAS
Jun 7 2023
The automotive industry is running parallel races toward fully electrified and fully autonomous vehicles, and both races have a deceptively close finish line. EVs will become the norm within 10 years due to a combination of government legislation and manufacturer mandates – Progressive estimates that EVs could comprise 40% of car sales by 2030. Vehicle autonomy, meanwhile, remains a top priority for OEMs as well, with the market projected to reach $200 billion by the end of the decade. Mercedes-Benz is already certified for Level 3 autonomy, a standard that encompasses conditional hands-free driving, suggesting that Level 5 (totally automated driving) is a feasible goal for automakers more quickly than initially anticipated.
The technology involved in developing electrified, autonomous vehicles will not be universal; each feature package will have its own unique benefits, drawbacks, and relationship to road conditions and driver capabilities. Consequently, auto insurers cannot treat “ADAS” or “EV” as monolithic or even loosely segmented variables in their risk analysis; all levels of the organization must have a comprehensive understanding of their car’s technology stack to maintain a balanced risk-to-rate ratio. 
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