Fiat scion warns digital cars will kill brands

The disruptive marketing potential of newcomers to the automotive industry could spell the end for many struggling brands, Lapo Elkann told an audience attending the Automotive News Europe Congress last week.

Elkann, who is the great-great-grandson of Fiat co-founder, Giovanni Agnelli, hinted that some brands will disappear, in the face of increased pressure from legislators, consumers and competitors.

Chief among those competitors at the present time are tech companies like Google and Apple, both of which are better known for their work in information and communications technology (ICT).

"Their level of cash flows are so high we don’t know what they’re going to do," Elkann said.

That might well serve to explain FCA's recent joint-venture announcement with Google. Keep your friends close and your frenemies closer.

Elkann has not been an employee of Fiat since 2006 – a few years before it acquired Chrysler from the US government at the height of the GFC. But Elkann, as a current Fiat Chrysler Automobiles shareholder and a member of the Ferrari board of management, would have his ear to the ground.

Google is known to be collaborating with at least one other major player in the automotive industry, Ford.

And Elon Musk, founder of Tesla – itself a disruptive force within the automotive industry – recently added fuel to the fire of speculation that Apple was developing an 'iCar' when he told the BBC that the ICT firm was poaching Tesla's engineers.

The upstart companies like Tesla, Google, Apple and Faraday Future, to name but a few, may or may not succeed in the cut-throat automotive industry of the 21st Century, but their uncertain future doesn't mean bit players in the present are any safer. Elkann said as much.

"I believe that there will be fewer brands," he said. "Brands will unite and more brands will work hand in hand."

The question remains... which brands will go?