Berlin The German automotive industry has specified how it plans to collect data in the vehicles it sells in the future and sell it to third parties such as insurance companies or workshops – as well as to authorities who request this data, for example, for traffic control or to monitor fuel consumption. The concept is available to the Handelsblatt and is to be sent to the EU Commission shortly.
With the plans, the industry wants to convince the EU Commission not to overload the vehicles with new technical requirements again and again in view of the numerous regulatory plans, but to serve all data requests with one solution. Cars could use it to produce data like a smartphone, which would then be marketed centrally.
So far, there is no legal framework for the countless data that arise in a vehicle and that can be linked to the vehicle owner. Only the technical data for repairs and maintenance are regulated. The industry itself, specifically the Association of the Automotive Industry, wants to be the trustee for all data. On the other hand, however, potential data users such as the ADAC, the insurance industry and independent car repair shops are mobilizing. They are calling for a legal framework to ensure competition.
Billions in mobility data
Car manufacturers and suppliers alike sense that there is big business that they do not want to leave to third parties. Adaxo, “automotive data access, extended and open”, is the name of the association’s technical solution. This is an industry-specific data platform into which all relevant data from the vehicles in operation flow. It is about “a comprehensive range of data that is supported by all vehicle manufacturers across all models” and with which “new business models” are to be created.
Top jobs of the day
Find the best jobs now and
be notified by email.
The VDA also explains in the five-page position paper that Adaxo is “fair, reasonable and non-discriminatory”. The availability of the data and the access options are “not to be related exclusively to the vehicle, but also to the vehicle-related data from service providers, insurance companies, financing companies and in other downstream areas in the automotive environment”.
This is the only way to develop new offers “in the interests of the customer”. Its most valuable data is personal, such as driving behavior. The industry hopes that vehicle owners will rate the benefits of an insurance product (“Pay as you drive”) so highly that they will release their data. The VDA emphasizes that “active consent is required”.
In contrast, the plans arouse anything but enthusiasm among data users. “From the insurers’ point of view, the Adaxo concept is the wrong way to access vehicle data. Together with many other associations in Germany and Europe, we are campaigning for the concept of the so-called secure onboard telematics platform, ”said the chief executive officer of the Association of the Insurance Industry, Jörg Asmussen. There, the data is processed in the vehicle, and secure access takes place “according to strict criteria and decisions made by the owner or driver”.
ADAC considers the concept to be inadequate
Asmussen made it clear that in this way, the data would not have to be called up by the vehicle manufacturer “at a cost and in an inadequate scope and of inadequate quality”. “We see the customer and not the vehicle manufacturer as the contact person for data collection.”
The ADAC complains that technical details are not yet known and considers the concept to be “inadequate”. It is crucial that the consumer has access to his data and that the providers have non-discriminatory access to vehicle data. “The VDA concept does not meet either requirement,” said ADAC technology president Karsten Schulze. “The data continues to be controlled by the manufacturers, who decide whether and which data is made accessible.
The vehicle owner cannot freely decide who he wants to grant access to which data. Service providers such as independent workshops or automobile clubs are still dependent on the manufacturers’ discretion. “
The German motor vehicle industry argues similarly. With the Adaxo concept, vehicle manufacturers would be granted rights that they represent as self-appointed “contact persons for data collection”, the association complained when asked. “This means that the power to decide who is allowed and able to provide services in the vehicle rests exclusively with the vehicle manufacturer. This has massive restrictions on innovation and competition along all processes of the automotive value chain, from development to testing, operation and maintenance to warranty and cybersecurity management. “
Car manufacturers warn of hacker attacks
The VDA, however, warns of hacker attacks and argues with questions of liability if third parties have access to the car and possibly change data. This would give rise to complicated licensing issues and, above all, liability issues in the case of accidents.
With Adaxo, manufacturers and suppliers want to set the standard with which they can process data and make it available to third parties. Other data rooms such as the new German called Mobility Data Space (MDS) or the European Gaia-X platform are the exchange for all mobility data from traffic safety, infrastructure, local transport and much more, in order to then develop multimodal offers, according to the VDA.
However, companies can also conclude direct contracts with manufacturers via Adaxo to access the data. “The aim is to be able to serve the data market faster and thus to develop and offer new business models,” said the VDA.
Adaxo is the successor to the Nevada data platform concept developed in 2016 under pressure from the automotive supplier Bosch. The project was about to end in the spring when Volkswagen got out and hoped for the European regulation of data. Competitors like Tesla and Toyota, but also the big data companies Google, Apple and Co. should be subjected to the same rules.
Volkswagen is now back on board. The industry can therefore concentrate again on setting rules on the technical level and thus contain the competition from America and Asia and also benefit from the data business. They want to equip their vehicles with operating systems and control access in their app stores – just like Apple and Co. with smartphones.
More: How railways and car manufacturers want to exchange their mobility data in the future