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BMW's Apple CarPlay Annual Fee is Next-level Gouging (cnet.com)
BMW announced this week that the company plans to shift Apple CarPlay infotainment support from a one-time fee to a subscription service. Tim Stevens, writing about the implications of the move for CNET: While GM and other manufacturers happily include Apple's CarPlay service for free even on their most attainable models, BMW and plenty of others have levied upgrade fees to enable CarPlay, or bundled the service inside pricey packages of widgets you may or may not want. That, sadly, is par for this margin-rich golf course, but when we learned this week that BMW would change from a single, up-front fee to an annual fee, in my mind that changed everything. Instead of a one-time, $300 fee, starting on 2019 models BMW will charge $80 annually for the privilege of accessing Apple's otherwise totally free CarPlay service. You do get the first year free, much like your friendly neighborhood dealer of another sort, but after that it's pay up or have your Lightning cable metaphorically snipped.
On the surface this is pretty offensive, and it seemed like something must be driving this. The official word from BMW is that this is a change that will save many (perhaps most) BMW owners money. Indeed, the vehicle segments where BMW plays are notorious for short-term leases, and those owning the car for only a few years will save money over that one-time $300. But still, the notion of paying annually for something that's free rubbed me the wrong way. And, based on the feedback we saw from the article, it rubbed a lot of you the wrong way, too.
On the surface this is pretty offensive, and it seemed like something must be driving this. The official word from BMW is that this is a change that will save many (perhaps most) BMW owners money. Indeed, the vehicle segments where BMW plays are notorious for short-term leases, and those owning the car for only a few years will save money over that one-time $300. But still, the notion of paying annually for something that's free rubbed me the wrong way. And, based on the feedback we saw from the article, it rubbed a lot of you the wrong way, too.
Carplay isn't a service. It's a pair of software programs, one runs in your car - the other on your phone. Bizarre. BMW must want their customers to switch to Android, maybe they have an investment in Google or one of the Android handset manufacturers.
You have to pay for BMW Assist and navigation updates too. If you don't like it don't buy the car. It's easy.
All new Audis have CarPlay support. My A4 has a CarPlay and supports Android Auto too.
Other luxury brands that also have it without a recurring fee:
https://www.apple.com/ios/carp...
Mercedes
Volvo
Alfa Romeo
Porsche
Lincoln
Cadillac
Bentley
Astin Martin
Just don't buy a BMW -- the other brands are generally better cars anyway. Audis are awesome.
- Vincit qui patitur.
I wonder if BMW drivers would use turn signals if they were Apple branded and cost more?
The issue I have is that I can buy a $30k Japanese car and have 100k miles of absolutely...zero...problems. So I should be able to buy a $60k German car and have the luxury features, with absolutely...zero...problems. Though that does not exist. I don't why why the hell they can't pull it off.
Hey, centuries ago called. News papers, news broadcasts, and news websites contain, and have contained for decades editorial content. This is nothing new, or nefarious. The headline calls out that this is a commentary piece, not a news piece.
So no radios, either? Or AC/heaters? Those are much more distracting (more buttons, below my touch screen and requires eyes off the road) than CarPlay.
They says that for leases, the 'pay per year' method is cheaper, but let's boil that down.
On a three year least, with the 'pay per year' method, you'll pay $0 for your first year and $80 for each of your next two years. So $160 total.
If you leased the car with the one-time $300 fee, you don't pay $300. You pay Sales Price minus Residual. And the residual on some of these cars is up to ~60% of sales price. So lets say that the residual on a BMW is 58%, that means Car Play would have cost you $300* 0.42 = $126! Still cheaper! You'd have to have a residual less than 47% for the new method to be worth it.
Turn off all the 'entertainment center' bullshit.
Yeah, you tell 'em! Drive in complete silence, that'll make everything perfect. Better put those kids, spouses, and pets in the trunk too, don't want them distracting you.
A car should not be a lifestyle choice, it should be transportation.
And you better not get one damn bit of enjoyment out of driving your car either. This is an exercise in utility, you're not allowed to make this experience more bearable.
Quit being spoiled babies that need a bunch of toys.
Quit worrying about how other people live their lives, and I bet yours will improve too.
Way back in the day, one of the many reasons I went with the PS3 vs the Xbox360, was that they didn't require an anual fee to access services that were not provided by their network (youtube, netflix, etc...)
You apparently need to go and sit in a Volvo. They are most definitely luxury cars, at least on a par with Audi and BMW, though not on a par with Porsche and Bentley.
This isn't Apple - they don't charge for CarPlay. I don't pay anything extra for it in my Kia.
So what? They can pony up the fee if they want CarPlay and a BMW. If they object to the fee that much, they can opt against buying the car. Their choice. If this is really that much of a problem, then BMWs will take a hit in the used market, and not hold their prices as well. There's plenty of other cars on the market, and they don't charge this fee.
I think this move by BMW is just fine. If it works out, they'll make more profit. If it doesn't, they'll learn the hard way. Considering the people who buy BMWs, I suspect it'll work out well for them.
You've not owned a BMW in the last few decades. Drove a 2008 328i to over 125,000 miles and didn't have a single problem. According to Consumer Reports, Toyota and Lexus are #1 and #2 (but mind you, are the same company). Meanwhile, Audi and BMW are 4 and 5 and are actually separate companies. IMO, they'd be higher if they didn't have the high performance models (S4, M3, etc.). My M3 did have a few things go wrong, but they really push the engine, etc. to the limit.
Germans tend to over-engineer things and jump on all the latest tech, and Japanese tend to be very conservative and wait a while. So the Japanese cars usually aren't as cutting-edge as the German or even American cars.
The main problem with Japanese cars is that their infotainment tech is usually behind the others. Mazda and Toyota don't even have CarPlay or Android Auto available on their systems. The Germans have probably been doing infotainment longer than anyone else, so their systems are usually touted as the best.
Rents are the future of innovation.
Taste the Freedum!
Who is RTFM and when will he help me with Unix?
They says that for leases, the 'pay per year' method is cheaper, but let's boil that down.
On a three year least, with the 'pay per year' method, you'll pay $0 for your first year and $80 for each of your next two years. So $160 total.
If you leased the car with the one-time $300 fee, you don't pay $300. You pay Sales Price minus Residual. And the residual on some of these cars is up to ~60% of sales price. So lets say that the residual on a BMW is 58%, that means Car Play would have cost you $300* 0.42 = $126! Still cheaper! You'd have to have a residual less than 47% for the new method to be worth it.
You are assuming that the CarPlay license is part of that residual. Is CarPlay transferable to the new owner? Are you sure the "remainder" of the CarPlay fee goes into the residual value? I expect CarPlay is outside that residual. The residual is supposed to be the wholesale value of the car. If CarPlay is not transferable it can not be part of that value.
Right now it absolute is part of the residual. Right now in BMWs, CarPlay is an optional feature (despite that on most other cars CarPlay is included as a standard feature). Think of it like an optional sunroof. The leasee pays part of that cost just like he pays for part of the car in general.
My current car has CarPlay. If I sell the car to someone else, she gets CarPlay, too. Just like she gets the sunroof I paid extra for. It's part of the car. CarPlay isn't a service (like satellite radio, for instance). No one is coming to lock the sunroof shut in my car when I sell it. BMW will lock CarPlay, though.
No one else charges a yearly fee for CarPlay. My wife's near-poverty-spec Honda came with CarPlay, and it'll work years down the road even though we don't pay Honda anything for it.
If Kia can put Apple Car Play into even their cheapest base model cars as a standard feature, why the hell does BMW need to charge money (either a one-off fee or a monthly fee) for the thing?
The problem with something like this is that they're trying to extend the subscription model to everything. It's part of the physical goods makers' obsession with making consumers pay for a product over and over rather than owning it outright.
With rare exceptions, there are 2 types of people who buy BMWs:
- People who "rent" them on a throwaway basis on 2/3-year business leases, who will only pay $160 or $240 to rent CarPlay access before they turn it back in for another one. Even if it was $500 a year, the people in this set probably wouldn't blink an eye.
- People who buy them used because they like the cars, who will now not benefit from a pre-activiated CarPlay. Even many enthusiasts don't buy BMWs new...they're too expensive and it makes sense to let some doctor or real estate agent eat the depreciation.
BMW fans and Apple fans are also in the union part of that particular Venn diagram for the most part, so I'm really surprised they're doing this. Not really though...lately, they've been doing things like requiring that key parts like the battery be "programmed" by the dealer before they work, and basically any part with space for flash memory in it is a target for this too. (Adaptive headlight controllers are a good example.) I imagine that just like Office 365 and Adobe Creative Cloud, consumers will just accept paying and paying to use something they bought.
It's too bad they're continuing down this road. Infotainment and other electronics are already fiddly enough once they age sufficiently, and now you have to pay to access them.
LOL. You trust CR...chump.
VW/Porsche/Audi is one company. They've standardized. The perform like VWs, are reliable like Porsches and have maintenance costs and parts availability like Audis.
John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
How's life in the hypocrite lane?