Hyundai Announces Amazon Echo Integration
CARS.COM — If you own a Hyundai with the latest generation of the automaker’s BlueLink connected-car services, your car now works with Amazon’s Echo voice-recognition device. At AutoMobility LA, a tech-focused event on the eve of the 2016 Los Angeles Auto Show, Hyundai announced that the Echo works with the automaker’s second-generation BlueLink telematics system to start, lock or unlock a car, or adjust its cabin temperature.
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Owners can ask the Echo’s voice-recognition assistant, Alexa — akin to Apple’s Siri or Microsoft’s Cortana — to do those things through voice recognition alone, though their BlueLink PIN is also required. BMW and Ford have announced similar initiatives, and BMW’s Amazon Echo integration hit the market last month. But Hyundai’s Barry Ratzlaff said the automaker “is the first mainstream auto company” to get into the space.
“It turned on yesterday and it’s backwards-compatible,” said Ratzlaff, executive director of Hyundai’s digital business planning and connected operations division. The system will also allow owners to start or stop charging on the automaker’s forthcoming Ioniq plug-in hatchback, Ratzlaff told reporters. We asked if the Echo could eventually allow owners to ask their car to have a navigation address ready to go; Ratzlaff said he didn’t think Amazon’s ecosystem allows for it yet, but it’s “within the realm of possibility.”
Hyundai launched BlueLink, a subscription-based telematics service with smartphone and smartwatch integration, in 2011. A second-gen BlueLink system has been around since 2014. Available in every Hyundai except the Accent, BlueLink is in about half the cars Hyundai currently sells, Ratzlaff said. Amazon integration requires BlueLink’s Remote Access Package, available for $99 a year after the initial three-month free trial. It also requires a connected Amazon Echo device but not a subscription to Amazon Prime.
Hyundai’s just-launched Genesis luxury brand has similar Amazon Echo integration, albeit through a differently branded telematics system. Naturally, the Seattle-based company isn’t the only player in the connected-home field. Apple and Google are also in the space, the latter with a branded device — Google Home — with similar capabilities to the Amazon Echo. Hyundai technology spokesman Miles Johnson says there’s nothing in its relationship with Amazon that precludes Google Home integration at some point.
“We’ve got a great relationship with Google,” Johnson said. “Remember, we were the first to market with Android Auto.”
