More features will become available after you leave the dealer
BMW rebuffed for trying a similar move last year
If you love paying monthly for features that came built-in to your car, Audi has good news. For the rest of us, get ready for more monthly payments as Audi plans to add more “on demand” features into its next-gen cars.
With our next generation of electronic architecture, we will bring more offers to ‘function on demand’ and you will see year by year we will bring new functions in the cars,” Audi tech boss Oliver Hoffman told Autocar.
The exec claimed it was a response to customer demand and not just a desire for better profit margins.
Audi currently offers LED matrix headlights as an after-sale upgrade in some markets on the e-tron and e-tron Sportback models. It also offers semi-autonomous parking as an on-demand feature.
Hoffman wouldn’t say which features might be made optional. “This is a [big] step. I think there is a demand from the customer to bring new functions in the car, and this is a profit pool for us – but we don’t see these revenue pools with this kind of functionality.”
BMW tried a similar move in South Korea, adding a subscription-based heated seat in that market. It recently dropped the idea as customers didn’t bite. Sometimes it takes a few tries before a company manages to find the right way to extract maximum revenue.
