By Gadjo Cardenas Sevilla
The 2015 Canadian International AutoShow (CIAS) kicked off last week and while new cars were the focus, the future of EV and the connected car was on everyone’s mind.It was a good idea for me to start my coverage of the Canadian International AutoShow by test driving the new Tesla Model S.
This sports sedan is an innovative luxury five seater that also has the performance and acceleration of a more expensive exotic sportscar along the lines of a Ferrari or a Porsche. The Tesla Model S can go from 0-100 Kph in 3.4 seconds.
Through its test drive Tesla offered me a preview into the future of the motoring industry. It is an electric vehicle (EV) which means it has no petrol engine but runs two motors which in-turn enable an all-wheel drive drivetrain. Teslas get plugged in overnight and run purely on electricity, the range of the Model S with a 85 kWh battery pack is 265 miles (426 km).
It’s quite a jump to think of car performance in terms of batteries and electricity instead of litres and gallons but this wasn’t the only thing that I had to get used to when spending time in the Tesla Model S.
As one of the most high-tech performance cars in the market, Tesla’s Model S also innovates in the infotainment aspect of motoring. The Model S’s interior is bereft of buttons and switches, everything is controlled and toggled by a massive 17-inch touchscreen that isn’t unlike an iPad.
The Tesla has all the conveniences of a smartphone. It’s own LTE connection to the Internet, the ability to learn and geotag locations and cameras that can ‘read’ road signs and warn you if you’re speeding.
The Tesla Model S really felt like driving the future, but this slice of the future costs upwards of CAD $76,000.
Hints of Evolution
Back at the AutoShow, seeing the cars on display and what they had to offer was like going back to earth and to the present.
Mass produced electric vehicles are still a rarity and while companies like Chevrolet are pushing affordable EV’s or hybrids like the Chevy Volt.
BMW, Mercedes-Benz, Smart and other carmakers have some hybrid solutions that incorporate electric drives with some gas engine. These hybrids are still expensive and still feel like a weird compromise to many buyers looking to replace their cars.
I expected more in terms of Infotainment news at CIAS this year, specially since it has been a few months since Apple and Google released their car infotainment solutions.
While various carmarkers that exhibited at the show are known to have allied themselves to one platform, there wasn’t much in terms of new news or demos. At least during the media day, most of the infotainment or satellite navigation systems in the cars on exhibit were shut off.
So, while there were hints of evolution in car technology at the 2015 Canadian AutoShow, it felt like manufacturers were being a bit conservative.
Many of these vehicles may be “2015” model years, but they have been in the design and development stage for a number of years, which means since they were designed before the big infotainment platform announcements last year. Understandably, it will take some time to integrate these new technologies and solutions into current models.
