D ATA I S T H E N E W O I L
mobility provider already well underway, Brecht has already made clear the importance of using data to fuel services such as car sharing. But how far will the shift go? Can Brecht imagine a driverless world where nobody owns a vehicle? “I can imagine this, yes,” he answers. “Do I think it will come anytime soon? Probably not. I don’t think there has been a more difficult time to predict the future than today. It will certainly go in that direction. How far and fast I don’t think anybody can say right now.” According to Brecht, three barriers stand in the way of this becoming a reality. There are certainly some technical hurdles to overcome, although Brecht believes the legal obstacle may take longer to solve. Puzzling questions remain, such as who or what takes responsibility for a vehicle’s actions, and whether some countries will be quicker to update statute than others. “The most difficult
level of the challenge, however, is ethical,” Brecht states. This is especially the case when considering whether a human or a machine is responsible for certain decision making that could, ultimately, impact lives on the road. Human errors in judgement that lead to serious incidents are, of course, tragic accidents. However, the picture becomes far more complex when it is a piece of software that has to make a life-changing call. While for Brecht and Daimler a fully autonomous world of transport may be a long way off yet, the journey towards making data the lifeblood, or oil, of the company will continue to gather momentum. Asked what we can expect to see in five years, the CIO concludes: “In hopefully less than five years’ time we will recognise that data is the most important asset of the company, and something we can monetise. Analysing this data is great, but shared and mobility services can generate profit streams from connected cars. I am confident that we will see this happen very soon, sooner than five years.”
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