Talking to you car? Mercedes agentic AI is coming and it wants to have a chat

The changes in how drivers interact with their cars are going to be “mind-blowing” thanks to the impact of AI and how it integrates with the new breed of so-called software-defined vehicles, according to Mercedes' chief software officer Magnus Ostberg.

“I believe we're just in the front of the tsunami when it comes to agentic AI [which can make decisions independently] and how this is going to completely change how we interact with any machine; it's going to be mind blowing,” he told a small group of journalists including Auto Express at the Munich Motor Show last week.

“And I believe it's perfect for automotive because you’re in the perfect location to speak to your machine in a sensible way - you’re in a decent, quiet space and can actually have a conversation, it’s not like you’re in a public space.”

European drivers in general have been much slower than their Asian counterparts, for example, to adopt voice recognition as a way of controlling functionality in the car, but Ostberg said the way AI is changing how systems operate will encourage users to make more use of voice controls. 

He described it as a “paradigm shift” in how voice recognition works, moving from drivers needing to memorise precisely worded commands to speaking conversationally and the car understanding what is required. “With this paradigm shift in voice conversations in the car, the usage rate in the vehicles where we've activated this already, we've doubled and tripled the usage of our voice.”

“You’re going to see in the coming months how it’s moving away from touch and becoming more agentic,” Ostberg continued. “You actually talk to it and say what you want, and that information is presented rather than you go in, click on the app, click in the app, select something, and so forth.”

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