DETROIT -- General Motors Co. is releasing Marketplace, a commerce platform for on-demand reservations and purchases of goods and services located on the dashboard of select GM cars.
The program allows drivers to order food and coffee, find the nearest gas station and more. Marketplace is available in eligible Chevrolet, Buick, GMC and Cadillac vehicles. The program’s capabilities span multiple industries, from transportation to hospitality, food and fuel retailers.
“The average American spends 46 minutes per day on the road driving. Leveraging connectivity and our unique data capabilities, we have an opportunity to make every trip more productive and give our customers time back,” said Santiago Chamorro, GM’s vice president of global connected customer experience. “Marketplace is the first of a suite of new personalization features that we will roll out over the next 12 to 18 months to nearly 4 million U.S. drivers.”
Leveraging the embedded 4G LTE connectivity, GM is adding Marketplace to millions of existing 2017 and 2018 model-year cars, trucks and crossovers that have compatible infotainment systems, with continued rollout to compatible new vehicles. A separate data plan is not required to use Marketplace.
“For most retailers and consumer brands, the daily commute is the only time not accessible in a consumers’ day,” Chamorro said. “Marketplace gives merchants the ability to more safely engage with drivers and passengers in a meaningful way that provides true value for our customers.”
Marketplace is designed to be used while driving. It leverages machine learning from real-time interaction data, such as location, time of day and a driver’s established digital relationship with third-party merchants. In this way, GM hopes to offer a personalized experience to users.
Adhering to the industry's distracted-driving guidelines, as well as GM’s in-house safety guiding principles, GM designed its in-vehicle systems to minimize manual interactions, helping drivers keep their eyes on the road and their hands on the wheel, the company said.
To allow merchants to integrate their content as part of the in-vehicle Marketplace ecosystem, General Motors is working with three main platform partners: Xevo (xevo.com) in Seattle; Conversable (conversable.com) in Austin, Texas; and Sionic Mobile (sionicmobile.com) in Atlanta. GM is directing retailers interested in Marketplace to contact one of these platform partners or GM directly.
In the U.S., Detroit-based General Motors Co. sells vehicles under the Chevrolet, Cadillac, Buick and GMC brands.
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