Mercedes-Benz is testing ChatGPT as a voice assistant in its cars. As we understand it, the idea is to have a kind of Knight Rider-style experience with an AI co-pilot.
According to the company, drivers will be able to engage in conversations with the chatbot to ask for “details about their destination, suggest a new recipe for dinner, or answer a complex question,” all “without taking their hands off the steering wheel or eyes off the road.”
The beta program will be available for over 900,000 vehicles in the United States equipped with Mercedes-Benz’s MBUX infotainment system.
Drivers will be able to activate the experimental program starting from June 16th with the voice command “Hey Mercedes, I want to join the beta program.”
The update will then be installed wirelessly and free of charge, expanding the capabilities of the company’s current voice assistant using ChatGPT’s language models.
It makes sense to upgrade Mercedes’ voice assistant using the same AI language models that power systems like ChatGPT. As the company states in a press release, the update should allow drivers to interact with their MBUX voice assistant in a “more natural dialogue format.”
Talking to the car as if it were Kitt
The idea is to move away from predefined phrases and start having natural conversations with the car. This means that drivers won’t have to remember specific phrases to activate certain functions.
However, the integration also seems to be a way to hop on the AI bandwagon. In a blog post detailing the partnership, Microsoft boasts that the ChatGPT update will offer “expanded task capabilities” to Mercedes-Benz drivers, allowing them to ask “complex questions” and discuss recipes.
In any case, we are looking forward to hackers gaining access to these tools, as they could potentially access features of the car that are only reserved for subscriptions.
Perhaps they can use it to unlock the controversial “Acceleration Increase” subscription from the company, which charges $60 per month to boost acceleration in their latest electric cars. That would be a truly useful voice assistant. We’ll see how this turns out.
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