CES 2025: The 4th Screen is 3 Screens

The 58th Consumer Electronics Show saw an epic battle being fought for automotive cockpits and ultimately the hearts, minds, and wallets of consumers. While it's true that there was much discussion and demonstration of artificial intelligence and monetizing customer experiences in cars, the real financial opportunity clearly lies in delivering an immersive multimedia experience.

The fourth screen - to add to the smartphone, mobile computer, and television - as rendered in various booths at CES 2025 is a three-screen proposition (not counting the rearseat vid) with limitless possibilities for integrating Internet access, streaming audio and video, broadcast radio and TV content, social media, games, and, yes, conference calls. The number of speakers sprinkled about the interior often exceeds 20 and the decibels can be off the chart.

The significance of the audio experience in various cars at CES was the elevation of car audio. At a time when the West Hall, which replaced the North Hall as an automotive nexus, has shifted the focus away from the traditional aftermarket car audio players, the cars on display at Pioneer, Harman International, 3SS, Xperi, Mitsubishi Electric, Qualcomm, and elsewhere highlighted an emerging battle between Dolby Atmos and DTS:X.

While Dolby Atmos won the crown for the greatest number of show floor in-vehicle demonstrations, the Mercedes-Benz S Class in the Xperi booth equipped with RIDEVU showing IMAX Enhanced movies from Sony Pictures with DTS-X audio from Xperi may have been the most impressive. The significance of all of these demos, though, was the implication for added vehicle cost at the point of sale and recurring revenue from subscription services after the sale.

More important even than that, though, is that these three screen solutions deliver a content consumption experience capable of luring viewers and listeners out to their cars and away from their massive in-home entertainment sources. And more important still is the ability to demonstrate advanced in-vehicle audio and video experiences on the showroom floor of your nearest dealership.

Mercedes-Benz is first to deliver a vehicle, the S Class, with a third (i.e. passenger-side) screen viewable only by the passenger when the vehicle is in motion. This elusive value proposition has been in development by auto makers and their suppliers for at least two decades, but Mercedes-Benz is the first to market with front seat passenger side video content. And, yes, the system encourages the passenger to listen with headphones.

All of the many enhanced audio-video demonstrations at CES promised immersive experiences capable of vibrating the vehicles in which victims, I mean show attendees, were taking them in. The 3SS executives conducting their demonstrations in a tricked out Lotus SUV apologized for the fact that they hadn't yet synchronized the in-vehicle LED accent lighting with the on-screen audio and video content.

The car has always been a unique audio environment characterized by a collection of noise cancellation and suppression systems designed to mitigate distraction and eliminate harshness. Now auto makers are out to fill that carefully curated audio space with rich and varied content.

The content that has always been available in cars is the radio. In spite of radio's unique role in the car, not all auto makers have been capitalizing on the growing variety of innovations transforming radio listening.

The greatest advances in radio technology have been emanating for years from Xperi, previously known as iBiquity Digital - which brought HD Radio technology to the North American market more than 20 years ago. The HD Radio digitization of broadcast radio has made this content searchable while simultaneously expanding the number of stations supported by the FM "dial."

HD Radio (and its cousin DAB outside the U.S.) have ushered in the integration of data elements, station and content meta data and tagging, and new interactive advertising opportunities. The in-dash radio of 2025 bears no resemblance to the twinned radio dials of old with their push-button presets.

Further innovation has come from companies such as GeoBroadcast Solutions and its Maxxcasting and Zonecasting technology for enhancing local signals and localizing transmissions, respectively. Quu has also emerged to accelerate the transition to a meta data infused listening experience.

In these ways, radio has become a visual experience on a par with movies and other streaming sources - just a bit less distracting. More importantly, the stage has been set for the next generation in in-car radio innovation. At CES, Xperi was talking about, showing, and demonstrating its Music Finder function - a capability that will allow radio listeners to see what's playing on other stations in real time - not unlike an electronic programming guide for your car radio.

In fact, there's yet another unsolved challenge awaiting the next phase of innovation. Voice-based search providers have yet to master the content management proposition being posed by in-vehicle systems capable of integrating broadcast, streaming, podcast, and recorded content. Hop to it, boys and girls. The public awaits and is going to lap up these new four-wheeled content compendiums. These systems will look great in television ads, on the showroom floor, and maybe someday soon in your driveway.