The latest MG Motor digital showroom in Bengaluru is everything that a typical car showroom does not look like. Most importantly, it has no cars on display. Envisioning the future of retailing, the car manufacturer has unveiled the country’s first carless digital studio which is driven by visual immersive technology to give potential customers a 360 degrees tour of the vehicles before they make the buying decisions.
Started on a pilot basis, the company aims to take this car-less showroom concept to several locations across India as it drastically reduces the cost of operations.
“The purpose of setting up a car-less showroom is that typically in big cities, one cannot open big showrooms in busy neighbourhoods. Through this concept, the cost of operations goes down to one-fourth the cost of a normal car showroom, which is between Rs 20 lakh and Rs 25 lakh (per month),” said Rajeev Chaba, President and Managing Director, MG Motor India.
“This can revolutionalise retailing as we can go to several touch-points closer to the customers at a much lower price,” he added.
Spread in a small area of 600 square feet, which is much lesser than the size of a regular automobile showroom, the digital studio welcomes a customer with an artificial intelligence (AI) based human recognition screen. Once a customer enters the showroom, the screen captures his/her picture and asks some basic questions. Based on that data, it customises the potential buyer’s profile so that the salesman can communicate with the customer in a personalised way.
Next you move to a navigator which is connected to a giant 9 feet visualizer. There are three variants of the tour that the visualizer provides based on the time available with the customer -- that is 5 minutes, 10 minutes and 15 minutes 3D tours. By giving the voice command of “Hello MG”, one could activate the visualizer. One can get a 360 degree view of the exteriors, interiors, and safety features of the car either via touch screen or voice command. The engagement tool provides a close experience of navigating through the car, without the car, such as adjustment of seats, dimensions, opening and closing of sunroof, switching on and off of lights, opening of boot space. It also gives the option of scanning through the engine and innards of the car which is not possible in a physical vehicle. The visualizer also assists a user to scan through the interactive iSmart screens, which are fitted in the company’s flagship Hector models.
MG Motor has tied up with Mumbai-based start-up Eccentric Engine for its automotive visualization platform. “We believe that the future of automotive sales is omnichannel. We look forward to partnering with MG Motor to visualize their products through more futuristic touch points,” said Varun Shah, co-founder, Eccentric Engine.
Once a customer is done with the visual tour, he/she can opt to test drive the car, which will be available in the parking lot outside the showroom. Bookings for the vehicle can also be done simultaneously from the same place.
With competition intensifying in the utility vehicles segment, a lot of players are shifting gears and moving towards technology to attract buyers. Hyundai Motor is providing an AI-based technology service called Blue Link which provides an easy flow of critical information between the user and the car. This technology has an inbuilt SIM card and a 24x7 call centre that has features like live tracking, crash and panic alert. It also has a remote engine start feature limited to automatic variants.
General Motors is also looking at embedding Google technology in its cars to enable voice activated controls, starting 2021. Even Amazon is in talks with car companies to embed its voice enabled technology Alexa in vehicles.
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