Ford has been on a big software push over the past few years, and for good reason – such things are incredibly profitable for the automaker, and with over-the-air update capability, customers can receive continuous improvements overnight while vehicles are parked. In addition to its expansive list of software features designed for Ford Pro commercial customers, the BlueCruise hands-free highway driving assist feature has thus far proven to be quite popular and profitable as well, and in fact, The Blue Oval just lowered its price last October. As far as Ford’s cross-town rival General Motors goes, it’s also betting big on its own version of BlueCruise – a feature dubbed Super Cruise.
In fact, according to GM Authority, the General expects Super Cruise to generate a massive $2 billion in annual revenue for the company within five years. “2025 will also be a year of rapid growth for Super Cruise across all of our brands,” said GM CEO Mary Barra. “Our customer-focused strategy with Super Cruise is to continuously refine and expand its capabilities to make it indispensable. This is how we are setting the stage for recurring high-margin revenue streams from subscriptions.”
GM also revealed that 20 percent of owners opt to keep Super Cruise and pay for it after the existing three-year trial expires, which is seemingly a solid number for any sort of digital service. It’s unclear how much revenue Super Cruise has generated for GM since its inception, but Barra’s comments seem to indicate that it’s a healthy figure, indeed.
As is the case with BlueCruise, Super Cruise also continues to expand in terms of the sheer number of vehicles that it’s offered in, which should continue to drive those numbers higher. After originally launching in Cadillac models, Super Cruise has since expanded across the entire portfolio of GM brands, and is now included as standard equipment on several of them.
Comments
$2B might cover the litigation when these self-driving algos replace drivers in court. I can’t wait for the first Bluecruise vs. Supercruise accident, which algo was at fault?
And this is different from an accident caused by human drivers how? Oh, they were in “control”.
That means that GM must be delivering results and actually updating its software when they promise. Unlike Ford that refuses to commit to any model or timeline for any update that may or may not actually exist for BlueCruise.
I can tell you that after 2 years I am not going to renew my BlueCruise based on Ford’s lies and fraud at supporting this beta release 1.0 death trap.
No update, no renewal.