Although convinced of the enormous business potential of telematics, automotive manufacturers have been uncertain as to the precise content that end-users envisage, the service packages they most value and how much they are prepared to pay for the individual components of the telematics system. The main objective of the research was to establish customers' preferences for the individual features of the telematics system and their willingness to pay for the individual and combined components. In addition, the research measured awareness and usage, customer opinions as to the quality of different offerings from different providers and their preferences for billing, position and display options. Accent developed a programme of stated preference surveys, which were conducted in October and November 2002 among customers who had purchased a new car within the previous two years. The surveys comprised computer-aided telephone interviews, each lasting about 30 minutes, and four hundred interviews were conducted, 100 each in the UK, France, Germany and Italy, using mother tongue speakers. Segmentation was applied to the new cars, which were divided into four different price bands. The analysis of the choices provided the data from which to establish the relative importance and the monetary value of each component of the telematics system. A report of the findings is being offered to automotive manufacturers to assist them in prioritising which features to include in their cars and how much their potential customers value them. For the covering abstract see ITRD E126595.
Abstract