Mercedes has offered a preview of the interior of its new E-Class saloon coming later this year and has provided a glimpse of its next-generation operating system arriving towards the middle of the decade.
As expected, the 2023 E-Class is big on tech but, notably, features the video app TikTok as a built-in feature accessed through its slick operating system. While that may seem a little off-beat and redundant given the older demographic of the typical E-Class buyer in Ireland, it's a clear demonstration of the importance of the Chinese market to Mercedes, where a wide variety of in-car entertainment options is seen as a must-have.
"Let's not forget," said Mercedes boss Ola Källenius, "that the average age of an S-Class owner in China is around or below 40 years old."
That's clearly very much illustrative of Mercedes' thinking when it comes to the design direction of the new E-Class interior.
Superscreen
The biggest talking point of the new E-Class interior is the optional "Superscreen" design which, as its name suggests, isn't as big as the enormous dashboard-spanning Hyperscreen seen in the Mercedes EQS and others.
Rather than blending the driver's instrument cluster into the central infotainment display, the cluster is a separate unit in front of the driver, while the infotainment screen is merged with another screen in front of the passenger.
The passenger screen can be used on the move, and in order not to distract the driver, several safeguards are in place. It can only operate when sensors detect that the passenger seat is occupied, and when it isn't, it functions as a "digital decorative feature", like a computer screensaver.
The screen is lit in such a way as to reduce its ability to be seen from the driver's seat, and with a camera system monitoring the driver's eye movements and steering wheel inputs, the car can sense whether the driver is looking across at the passenger screen and further dim it accordingly.
Upgraded MBUX operating system
Running the latest and significantly updated version of Mercedes' MBUX operating system, the user interface on the central infotainment screen has been arranged to make it easier and more intuitive to use. The new interface is designed to more closely resemble that of a smartphone, and although the next-gen E-Class will feature both Apple CarPlay and Android Auto smartphone mirroring, the new system aims to present something that's altogether more attractive to drivers and which they're more likely to use than simply pairing their phones with the car.
The updated operating system provides access to third-party app developers. It will come as standard with TikTok, the Vivaldi web browser, the game Angry Birds, the Cisco Webex collaboration tool and the Zoom video-conferencing app. A camera for recording videos, taking selfies and participating in Zoom calls sits atop the dashboard, all of which does prompt some privacy and security questions given recent bans on TikTok by both the US government and European Commission over surveillance concerns by the Chinese company.
Nightclub lights
As well as the new screen and operating system design, the next E-Class interior will feature nightclub-style ambient lighting in a broad range of colours that flashes and pulses in rhythm with the music or video currently playing.
The system also plans to use artificial intelligence to recognise driver routines and to link up interior functions with specific conditions, such as switching on the seat heating and setting the ambient lighting to a warm orange glow if the temperature gets below, say, 10 degrees Celsius.
Preview of next-gen system
Advanced though the new generation of the MBUX system is, Mercedes, says that it's only a "precursor" to its new MB.OS operating system, which it plans to roll out towards the middle of the decade with the launch of its upcoming MMA electric vehicle platform.
The firm said the new system is being developed entirely in-house to "retain full control over the customer relationship, ensure data privacy and to leverage the unique integration of all car functions."
MB.OS will, said the company, eventually become standard across the entire Mercedes range, with all functions connected in some way to the Mercedes-Benz Intelligent Cloud. It's not difficult to see why Mercedes is going all-in on connected systems like MB.OS - it's extremely profitable and that's something the company unashamedly admits. The company earned some €1 billion in 2022 from connected services such as navigation, Live Traffic services and online map updates. So profitable is software now that the firm aims to allocate a full quarter of its research and development budget to the field by 2025.
Like the MBUX system due to appear in the new E-Class, MB.OS will allow owners to expand the infotainment offering by giving them access to third-party video, gaming and productivity apps. Sets of functions (all available over the air) will be sold in bundles to simplify the add-on process.
For instance, the MB Connect bundle will contain functions such as sat-nav, remote access and security monitoring; MB Charge will give drivers access to plug-in-and-pay EV charging and preferential tariffs; MB Drive will allow owners the opportunity to upgrade their advanced driver assistance systems.
Serious hardware
Underpinning MB.OS will be some serious hardware and software engineering nous. The navigation system, though Mercedes branded, will be built on Google technology, offering the benefits of integrated maps and real-time traffic information, among others.
Mercedes has formed a partnership with Luminar for advanced lidar modules to help control the advanced driver assistance systems. All cars running MB.OS will, at the very least, be capable of Level 2 autonomy - essentially a highly-advanced form of cruise control with lane-keeping assistance and Stop & Go capabilities. At the higher end, though, Mercedes ultimately aims to offer Level 3 autonomy as an add-on option, using that Luminar lidar (as well as radar and a raft of cameras) to allow cars to conditionally travel at up to 130km/h. Mercedes currently offers its Drive Pilot Level 3 system on some versions of the S-Class which, in a very limited set of circumstances, drivers can take their hands off the wheel and let the car take over the driving. But for a few locations such as Germany and the US state of Nevada, the use of Level 3 systems is generally not yet legal and even in places where its use is permitted, it can generally only operate at speeds up to around 50km/h, making it more useful in traffic jams rather than for high-speed driving.
In order to handle all of the inputs from the various lidar and radar modules and cameras, Mercedes has also signed a deal with chip-maker NVIDIA for the use of the firm's Orin chipset. The advanced Orin chips can handle up to 254 trillion operations per second, making them just the kind of hardware Mercedes needs to allow it to roll out its next-generation driver assistance systems.
Although the new E-Class with its updated MBUX system is expected to offer a reasonably close approximation of how MB.OS will look and operate, the full capabilities of MB.OS likely won't be seen by the car-buying public until 2025 at the earliest.