It’s easy to criticize US automakers and their tepid approach to electric vehicles under the current administration and the expiration of the EV tax credit . It’s also easy to look at the rest of the world’s embrace of EVs and wonder if the US is entering a “Malaise 2.0” era. Which is why GM wants the world to know that it is still focused on its end goals of electrification, autonomy, and improving vehicle quality while reducing development time.
At this year’s GM Forward event, company executives announced that its hands-off, eyes-off Super Cruise technology will expand across the lineup and be available on nearly every vehicle. This will include the pickup trucks and the crossovers, and not just the Escalade IQ that it was announced for last year.
Sterling Anderson, GM’s head of product, said the company is testing this technology to the tune of 1 million miles (1.6 million km) a month in both the virtual and real world. The goal is that not only would the vehicle be able to take you places, but it could go and do things for you.
That sounds rather dystopian. But Anderson told Ars in an interview that once you realize what your vehicle is capable of doing (beyond the paradigm of being a car to go places), it opens up a world of convenience that might be hard to envision right now. He’s not talking about an Optimus-style robot that’ll do your laundry, but a tool that you use every day that expands to do more things.
GM’s newly announced OnStar AI will play a role. “Imagine you worked late, and you get in your car to go home,” he told us. “Your car might remember that you ordered takeout from a restaurant recently that you frequent and like. The car could prompt you and place a pick-up order for you, which will be ready when you arrive to pick it up.”
