As cars get more and more technological resources, the practice automakers charge for access to features and updates. One of the most common ways to find paywalls in vehicles is through subscription plans, just like bmw starts offering users access to heated seats in their cars.

This practice of the company was discovered by several news portals last week. edge detailing that this practice may become common in the future. This subscription plan is currently being tested in South Korea, where consumers who bought their car with these seats and paid for them will also have to pay. monthly fee to use the feature.

Currently bmw offers a monthly, annual and lifetime subscription to the feature, as well as a free month for the user to test the feature they purchased with their vehicle. The portal notes that this practice is nothing new for the German manufacturer, which has already tried to charge $80 per month for users to use Apple CarPlay this is Android Auto in their vehicles.

Credits: BMW reveal

Signatures are increasingly found on cars

O edge It was pointed out that this practice is typical not only for bmwwith several other traditional automakers such as Volkswagen, Toyota, Audi, CadillacPorsche, and even new ones, like Tesla, offering different types of subscriptions. The purported reason for this practice is that profit margins on car sales are shrinking and companies are preparing to find other ways to make more money.

The current example given by the portal is General Motors, which has already earned about $2 billion in revenue from feature car subscriptions alone last year. But grandmaster is just starting to offer training and plans to make $25 billion a year by the end of the decade.

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However, the addition of payment barriers for certain features does not appear to affect the cost of the cars. with an analyst Sam Abuelsamidgives Guidesaid edge that average car prices are approaching $48,000, one of the highest values ​​in US history.

Source: Edge

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