设计让联网汽车开进现实

    亨利•福特发明的装配流水线作业曾经引发了汽车制造业的一场革命。使用了皮带生产线之后，“他们把装配一辆福特（Ford）Model T汽车的时间从1913年的12小时30分钟缩短到了1914年的1小时33分钟。”

    一百年过去了，在如今的数码时代，汽车工业需要另一个革命性的创意来改革汽车的生产和设计。就像医疗和银行等行业一样，汽车工业也必须思考如何重构基础架构，以便适应“超互联”时代下新一代驾驶员和乘客的需求。并不是说我们要对汽车本身进行彻头彻尾的改造——比如会飞的汽车或是谷歌（Google）正在搞的那种无人驾驶汽车，而是说我们需要一种全新的汽车制造模式。而联网汽车可能就是我们想要的模式。

    开始搞联网汽车之前，我们首先要利用发散思维想一想，一辆汽车都可以做些什么。也就是说首先把它想象成一个数码空间，而不只是一个交通工具。

整合软硬件

    很多汽车厂商都觉得，消费者可能在汽车里也想拥有像智能手机一样的体验。但正是这种看法导致汽车里的触摸式仪表盘非常不好用。在这方面，各大汽车厂商可以学习一下其它碰到类似问题的行业是怎么做的。

    比如很多智能电视也采取了像智能手机一样的应用界面，但是看电视的用户们却非常失望。因为当他们想放松的时候，他们只想赶快看到电视节目，而不是在此之前还得必须点选几个无关的屏幕。在一辆真正的联网汽车里，用户想要的是真正的无缝整合，而不需要想太多。他们仍然需要简洁明快的旋钮和按键，而不是被一块复杂的数码触摸屏分心。毕竟他们关心的还是最基本的体验——驾驶。

    目前，这种数码体验已经被植入了现有的汽车设计里，几乎成了每辆车必备的零件。我们不妨想象一下，如果智能手机的创始人当初关注的是硬件而不是软件，把所有精力都放在手机的壳子上，是否还会有今天的智能手机？要想创造一辆真正出色的联网汽车，必须在整体的互动系统体验上先行一步，围绕“软件”进行硬件设计。

当导航遇上推荐

    如果我们能彻头彻尾地重新设计一辆车，把服务设计作为汽车生产的中心，那么我们应该可以打造出更好、更集成的解决方案以适应人们的需求。对于联网汽车来说，一个至关重要的部分就是智能导航。比如诺基亚公司（Nokia）的Nokia Here就是在路径寻找和智能导航上做得最好的三大全球级竞争者之一。这家公司不仅为亚马逊（Amazon）的Kindle Fire、Facebook以及微软（Microsoft）的必应地图等提供地图平台，而且大多数汽车导航系统也都使用了他们的技术。我们已经发现，人们对于地图的需求并不只是基本的导航和引路那么简单。

    Henry Ford's visionary idea of the moving assembly line spurred a revolution in car manufacturing. With a conveyor belt production line, "they cut the time taken to assemble a Ford Model T from 12 hours and 30 minutes in 1913 to just one hour and 33 minutes the following year."

    A hundred years on, and the car industry needs another revolutionary idea to transform its production and design for a digital age. Like the health care and banking industries, the car industry must rethink its fundamental structure in order to adapt to the needs of a new generation of ultra-connected drivers and passengers. Without reengineering the fundamentals of the car -- Google's (GOOG) driverless car project, or flying car fantasies -- we need a totally new paradigm in car manufacturing. Right now, the behavior of wired passengers is an afterthought.

    In order to unleash the connected car, we need to reframe our thinking about what a car is capable of. This might mean imagining it primarily as a digital space, rather than solely a transportation device. Here's how:

Integrating the hardware with the software

    Carmakers have struggled to move beyond the idea that consumers want a smartphone experience within the car, but this view has made digital experiences in the car, like touchscreen dashboards, appear clunky, Frankenstein additions to an analog design that has been honed over the decades. Manufacturers could learn from other industries that have run up against similar problems.

    Smart TV users have grown very frustrated with an overly complicated application grid that mirrors the interface of their smartphone. When they're trying to relax, they don't want to go through several screens before being able to enjoy a show. Within a truly connected car, users will want seamless integration, without having to think too much about it. They will still desirethe ability to physically touch and maneuver knobs and dials, rather than being distracted by a complex digital dashboard. After all, they must focus on the primary experience: driving.

    Currently, these digital experiences are plugged into an existing design of the car, almost as accessories. Imagine if smartphone creators focused on the hardware over the software, putting all energies into the casing. To create a truly great connected car, these features must take precedent in a holistic interactive system with the hardware of the car designed around the "software."

When navigation meets recommendation

    If we were to design from the inside out, putting service design at the heart of car production, we could create better, more integrated solutions that adapt to people's needs.

    A crucial component of the connected car is smart navigation. One of the top three global players in route finding and smart mapping is Nokia Here (NOK). Not only does the company provide mapping platforms for key tech players, like Amazon's (AMZN) Kindle Fire, Facebook (FB), and Microsoft's (MSFT) Bing Maps, they're behind the majority of in-car navigation systems. We've found that people want more from their maps than basic navigation and traffic indicators.