Picture the future for a moment - How will the world look in 2050? How will people travel from point A to B? With what energy source?  With what vehicles?  From what countries? Will people everywhere drive as much as we do in the developed world today? Will the Earth be able to support 2 or 3 billion automobiles? Read on to find the answers to some of these questions.
 
Historically, automobiles have been built with the consumer in mind, not the environment, urban public planning, or social concerns.  The consumer will remain the top priority; however, the latter issues will become, and to some effect, are becoming important as well. Although many consumers feel that automotive brands have neglected their wants and needs, due to the slow integration of new digital technologies into many vehicles, manufacturers are tightly bound to a long product cycle which limits innovation. Unlike an iPhone, whose product cycle is 1 to 2 years, a vehicle’s can be 5 to 7 years, due to the complexities of such a large piece of machinery. In the near future, manufacturers will shrink product cycles and consumers will see a great deal of change in the vehicles being offered - with a greater emphasis on not just the consumer, but the world around them.
 
For automotive manufactures, this means greater costs in expanding their line of vehicles in less time. However, this is something that they’ll have to contend with if they want to survive in a highly competitive market.  R&D costs are already sizable, especially for some manufactures making their way into the electric engine segment. Many are partnering with battery manufacturers, such as Sanyo, LG and Samsung to lighten the financial load, but regardless of partnerships, the industry will become more competitive with new manufacturers from BRIC economies gaining greater recognition in the coming years. Hybrid or all electric vehicles, however, will not be the only option in the future. The future consumer will be able to choose from highly efficient gas, diesel, hybrid, pure electric, bio, fuel cell, and hydrogen engines.
 
This being said, the next decades will be the “era of options” in the automobile industry. Vehicle categories and engine variants, which currently seem very niche, are just the tip of the iceberg of the product palette that will be offered in years to come.
 
Currently, many manufacturers are intently focused on electric, but some are still trying to leverage the power of hydrogen. The notion of a hydrogen engine is part blasphemy, part punch line in the automotive industry, due to the high cost and energy required to create a suitable economical hydrogen platform. However, the technology is not dead to many engineers, who believe anything is possible. Although, BMW has parked the technology in the garage for the moment, Mercedes is pushing forward and plans to launch their first en mass hydrogen vehicle, the F-Cell, in 2015 on the European A series platform. Additionally, Germany is investing 30 million Euros in a hydrogen highway system, encompassing roughly 1800 kilometers of road, with hydrogen pumps every 50 km. In the meantime, Mercedes is focusing on their next major launch in 2014, the E-Cell, a full electric vehicle. Daimler-Mercedes boss Dr. Dieter Zetsche recently said, “We want to be winners in the green movement and focus on sustainability, not just speed and horsepower.”
 
Way ahead of the European electric competition, but still trying to muster up an environmental image is Nissan, which just launched the Leaf stateside, the first full electric vehicle in their lineup. A few third party automotive suppliers have become engaged in electric as well. One of those is Micro-Vett, located just outside Bologna, Italy, which transforms ordinary Fiats, into plug-ins, by swapping out engines, transmissions, and exhaust systems. So far they’ve “greened” 5000 vehicles which are mostly sold to state and local agencies around Europe. In the world of electric, China is ahead, as the largest manufacturer of lithium ion batteries. Urban mobility is of extreme importance in Shanghai and Beijing, where 50% of all two-wheel vehicles are completely electric. Furthermore, China has the world’s largest reserves of Lithium and Neodymium, the building blocks for the creation of electric motors and battery cells. Currently, 90% of the world’s batteries come from Asia. China is the industry and world leader in batteries, not however, in automobiles. But that could change quickly.
 
Electric Hybrids have proved themselves on the road, making them a contender for future success, but not all roads are alike. Hybrids have been most successful in two cities, Los Angeles and Tokyo. Why? Traffic. Hybrids are extremely well suited for stop and go traffic scenarios over long distances. Much to the Toyota engineers’ surprise, when tested on the Autobahn in Germany, they were actually less efficient than a Volkswagen clean diesel.
 
However, the image of electric hybrid technology, especially in the United States, remains superior. This is one reason why German manufacturers are quickly warming up to the hybrid strategy of the Japanese. In 2010, VW will launch the Touareg Hybrid and the Porsche Cayenne and Audi Q7 will follow. The 7 Series and X6 will represent BMW’s commitment to the hybrid strategy this coming year. Mercedes will have the S400 Hybrid with an M class hybrid to follow. These vehicles will all be priced at least 20% higher than their oil-slurping contemporaries, however government subsidies might help the consumer.

In my opinion, manufacturers who focus too intently on electric might end up harming themselves in the long run by morphing into a battery company rather than a forward thinking automobile company. Toyota has proclaimed that they will completely eradicate the combustion engine and only offer electric vehicles in the future. This seems counterintuitive, as new technologies, regardless of their source, need to be considered. The best strategy is providing variety. Most successful consumer brands know this and use such product planning to their advantage by building a range of options so that the consumer can choose what fits his or her lifestyle. Currently, the world’s largest manufacturer, Volkswagen, is creating the broadest assortment of engine technology.
 
Martin Winterkorn, VW’s man at the helm recently stated, “We don’t have the ambition to be the first, but rather the ambition to be the best.” Making the traditional combustion engine smaller and more efficient, making Diesel cleaner, creating synthetic fuels as well as bio-fuels, creating hybrids out of diesel and regular gas engines, and bringing full electric vehicles to the market are ventures VW is undertaking on their quest to be the best.
 
Not only will consumers have an array of engine types to choose from, but, with socio-migrational trends coming to bear, they’ll also choose a car based on where they live. If you’re an urban dweller, then you’ll purchase a car that is designated for the “city.” To some extent this is the mindset that we use to purchase vehicles today - a truck to haul, an SUV to traverse back roads, or a sub-compact to navigate the city. However, in the future you’ll be mandated to purchase a vehicle that matches your zip code. The trend of urbanization, which has been well documented by population analysts in the last years, will lead to suburbs being swallowed by the growth of cities, creating mega cities. If you live in a town outside the city, or in a rural area, you will purchase an “open space” vehicle. In many ways this will relegate city folk to the city and rural folk to the areas outside the city. Both vehicles will be outfitted with options that will be appropriate to the environment in which they are going to be driven. This might sound un-American, but due to the future size of cities, efficiency will rule over independence.
 
BMW is currently in the planning phase of such a “city” vehicle, dubbed the MegaCity, a pure electric vehicle that encompasses the needs of the future urban dweller. Who is this futuristic persona? He or she is single and lives in a multi-million-person city. Such a vehicle doesn’t need to drive long stretches, but has to be chic, small, light, maneuverable, practical and safe. Expect its debut somewhere around 2015.
 
Surprisingly, American manufacturers have garnered a substantial amount of PR and press recently by focusing on compact, gas sipping vehicles, at both the Detroit and Los Angeles Motor shows. The Ford Focus and Fiesta, Chevrolet Cruze and Aveo, and the GMC Granite show a new commitment to smaller, more efficient cars and a departure from their previous auto show strategy of presenting concept muscle cars with lots of horsepower. Let’s see if they continue to rally at the New York Auto show in April.
 
Another area in which BMW is playing pioneer is the availability of the internet in the automobile. They will be the first manufacturer to offer the internet in their vehicle line-up. We’re already surfing the web on our phones and navigating the road with GPS, so it’s a natural progression to be fully connected through your vehicle. BMW will use EDGE technology (Enhanced Data Rates for GSM Evolution), to beam content without coverage issues. However, due to the large size of multimedia content, a server between the vehicle and internet provider, will be set up to filter large streams of data, making them simpler to be viewed on larger screens (ad banners will be removed). For safety reasons, the service will only be available to passengers when the car is in motion, which makes sense, seeing how many accidents occur just from texting today. But even when the driver can’t navigate the net, he is still benefiting from the internet connection - emails can be read to him as well as on the minute and mile traffic notifications. The digital connection also runs the other way as well; should anything be wrong with the vehicle, it will notify the dealership of the problem, to ready the necessary tools and parts for the repair. Sounds like a scene from Will Smith’s sci-fi film I,Robot, however, this technology will debut next year.
 
Other technologies that will impact a vehicle’s structure are also being developed. Weight is a large factor in fuel consumption; however weight often suggests better safety. This notion will become irrelevant when lighter, yet more rigid materials become more cost effective to construct the everyday automobile. For now these technologies are restricted to vehicles like the Lexus LFA, which has one of the most advanced frame and exterior/interior panel constructions. It’s built with space age plastics infused with carbon fiber. Although, carbon fiber is widely popular in the tuning community, this variety is very rare and is finished piece by piece by a machine specifically made to mold the substance to perfection. In this instance, I believe Lexus’s motto could not be truer, as this vehicle embodies “the pursuit of perfection.”
 
Along with the consumer and where they reside, the environment is also a large factor in the future automotive landscape. Environmentally friendly zones are already the norm in many large European cities. Copenhagen, which implemented one of the strictest environmental zones in late 2008, requires vehicles that are 7 years or older and weigh more than 3.5 tons to have built in particle filters. These restrictions will tighten by 2012 in many hub cities throughout Europe, eliminating a sizable amount of city driving. London created the Congestion Charge Zone (CCZ) making it mandatory for vehicles to pay 8 pounds while driving within the zone Monday thru Friday. The zone was however instituted more for tax revenue than the environment, but it has cut congestion and created funds for new public transport projects. San Francisco is the latest city in the United States moving forward with a congestion pricing proposal.
 
Consumers should be sufficiently pleased that innovation in the automotive industry is moving quickly. Automotive brands will change the way we drive, use, and interact with vehicles in the next 20 years. Hopefully, they will bring about a semblance of balance amongst driver, place and environment.
 
 
About the picture: Pictured above is the BMW X1, which I experienced on a recent business trip to Hamburg, Germany. The planned MegaCity is expected to be built on the same chassis and take some functionality cues from the X1.