2022 Mercedes-Benz EQS, a fully electric sedan that directly targets Tesla’s top offerings, will offer an optional screen that spans the entire width of the dashboard. Mercedes is calling it the MBUX Hyperscreen, because it’s not just a screen, it’s also hyper.
MBUX, of course, is the infotainment system that Mercedes launched in 2018. MBUX Hyperscreen will be its most complete expression to date. The screen will be clear and smooth, with its OLED technology. It is 56 inches wide and 377 square inches of surface area.
But what is most interesting to me about this is how Mercedes says it is using artificial intelligence for customization.
Quoth Merc:
Mercedes-Benz researched the usage behavior of the first generation MBUX and found that most use cases fall into the Navigation, Radio / Media and Telephone categories. Therefore, the navigation application is always in the center of the display unit with full functionality for ease of use. More than 20 additional functions – from the active massage program to the birthday reminder and suggestions for a to-do list – are offered automatically with the aid of artificial intelligence, if they are relevant to the client. “Magic modules” is the internal name that the developers have given these suggestion modules, which are shown in layer zero.
Here are four examples of use cases. The user can accept or reject the respective suggestion with just one click:
1. If you always call a certain person on the way home on Tuesday nights, you will be asked to make the corresponding call on that day of the week and at a specific time of the day. A business card appears with your contact information and – if it is stored – your photo will appear. All MBUX suggestions are linked to the user’s profile. If someone else conducts the EQS on a Tuesday night, that recommendation would not be made – or another recommendation will be made, depending on the preferences of the other user.
2. If the EQS driver regularly uses the hot stone massage function presented in the optionally available Active Multicountour benches, the system learns and automatically suggests the hot stone massage function to the driver in colder temperatures.
3. If the user regularly uses the heated steering wheel and heated seat functions together, MBUX intelligently suggests enabling the heated steering wheel as soon as the user turns on the heated seat.
4. The suspension of the EQS can be raised to provide more ground clearance. A useful feature for steep sidewalks or speed bumps to create a smoother ride. MBUX remembers the GPS position where the user used the “Raise Vehicle” function. If the vehicle approaches this GPS position again, MBUX automatically suggests increasing the EQS.
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All Mercedes examples are not exactly essential, although I could see the height of the ride being useful if you lived somewhere where you would use it. In addition, the screen is an interesting glimpse into where infotainment in cars is going. (This is also far from the first big screen that we saw, very far.)
Mercedes, for example, is moving away from submenus – its so-called “zero layer” has more important apps available through no menu – which is a welcome change because submenus are often the most annoying part of using infotainment to new cars. This is also good because what people miss about buttons and buttons is that they put everything right in front of you.
Gorden Wagener, head of design at Mercedes, said the strategy is basically to create technology that users don’t hate all the time, as is sometimes said about touch screens in cars.
When I use MBUX, intuitively, I don’t have to think if and how. When we looked at the thinking of my parents’ generation, they were asking themselves: do I want to use technology? It is completely different today, the fusion of technology and design makes everything very easy: I want to use this technology. If technology can do a lot, but I have to discover the use, I am always at a distance. That’s why it’s important that our success is based on the idea that it should work as well as it looks.
Here are some more pictures; do not sleep in the openings.
