Synchronoss’ Integrated Life platform will be established as the interaction hub for merchants who will supply new and exciting value propositions to OnStar customers.
To paraphrase a joke from the movie Airplane!, “Yes, I speak hi-tech corporate hype!”
This is apparently yet another attempt to monetize automobile connectivity. It’s probably based on the thinking since people buy apps for their phones and tablets, they will also buy apps for their car.
…deliver…context-based in-car offers and services to subscribers from leading brands and merchants via OnStar AtYourService
This is not only not a big deal, it’s doomed to failure. Automakers have been trying to get owners to pay for connectivity or apps, with very poor results. People don’t want to pay another $10/month after spending thousands on a car. People don’t want a slew of apps with different user interfaces from each other on their car’s screen - they want driving related functionality that’s integrated and easy to use.
I know Synchronoss is trying to be some kind of single platform across all the devices a person owns (smartphone, tablet, laptop, smarTV and car), but I don’t see that as a strategy that will be successful. It’s not the delivery platform that matters, it’s the content.
For instance, as an Amazon Prime member I get to watch some movies and TV shows for “free.” The Amazon Video iPhone app has this really cool feature that enables me to download Prime movies to my phone for later watching, even if not connected. This is cool - I watched a movie on the airplane to CES this afternoon. But the flight was only 90 minutes, so I didn’t get to finish the movie. And just now, in my hotel room, I fired up Amazon on my laptop thru the hotel’s free WiFi and was able to finish the movie. And Amazon knew right where I had left off on the phone and was able to resume from there on the laptop. That’s an integrated experience, and that has to do with Amazon as a content provider, not some cloud infrastructure or device activation thing.