Honda puts its head in the cloud

Honda is looking to the Cloud for inspiration. With HondaLink, the Japanese giant joins other vehicle manufacturers’, mostly German, in an attempt to bring the online world into our cars via social media, cloud based services and other applications streaming directly to the infotainment system.

"Honda's strategy is about leveraging the Cloud to bring a wealth of new information and services to Honda owners," said Charles Koch, American Honda manager of new business development.

"This is the next evolution of the connected car and the connected customer."

In the US purchasers of cars with HondaLink can access a range of services when they connect their iOS or Android based device.

"HondaLink will enable customers to put away their phone and still stay connected to the people, music and media they love," said Vicki Poponi, assistant vice president of product planning for American Honda.

"By creating an intuitive and customizable user interface, HondaLink allows drivers to access digital content as easily as choosing a radio station."

Connecting the smartphone app to HondaLink enables content to be streamed, through the infotainment system of the vehicle. You can enjoy digital content seamlessly from the device as well as streamed via the Cloud, picking up from where you left off before the drive started, and book-marking the content when getting out of the car.

The Aha Radio service, which is part of the HondaLink package, is somewhat of a misnomer, providing more than radio as we commonly know it today. The service includes access to favourite podcasts, internet radio, on-demand music, personalized traffic reports, restaurant recommendations, and audio updates from Facebook and Twitter.

But what of Australian consumers, diddled as we are by expensive data download plans (compared to most other similarly set up countries) as well as coverage issues inherent with a geography versus population mismatch as big as our horizon? How will HondaLink work locally?

Alas it won't work at all – at this point Honda Australia has no plans for HondaLink or a similar service Down Under.

"HondaLink is a system set up by American Honda for customers in the United States,” company spokesperson Lindsay Smalley told motoring.com.au.

“It is another great example of how Honda is taking a lead in investing in new technology. If there was such a system designed for Australia, we would definitely consider it," he said.