The Crank: This year’s most important auto show won’t happen in Detroit or Frankfurt

By John LeBlanc The highlights on my annual business calendar are the “big” car shows. Call me a geek. But for me at least, there's nothing more exciting than to dive into these auto orgies, whether its Detroit in the winter, Geneva, New York, or China in the spring or, Paris, Tokyo, Frankfurt or Los Angles in the fall. But there’s one show I’ve never attended. And by the looks of its growing importance and affect on new car buyers, I’ll need to pencil in the first week of next January, and book a flight to Las Vegas, for the annual Consumer Electronics Show. In one of my recent Autonews columns in the Star, I briefly highlighted this year’s CES affair. It not only attracted a huge number of exhibitors and attendees, the the types of announcements being made at the Vegas show are becoming more and more important to new car buyers. It’s been a slow build, but software, not hardware, is where the action is in new cars these days. Over the past couple of years, the proportion of time manufacturers' pound us media over the head about USB this, or hands-fee that, is overshadowing the nuts and bolts of new cars. You may buy your car based on its fuel economy, performance, handling, or the badge on its grille. But a growing number of buyers aren’t. They’re more concerned if they can plug in their iPod, get the Chris Moyles show on BBC Radio 1 satellite radio, or check their email, all while driving. And some automakers, more than others, are all over this paradigm shift in the new car buyer decision making process. In his keynote speech delivered at the opening of this year's CES, Rupert Stadler, Chairman of the Board of Management of Germany's Audi AG (seen above with Gary Shapiro, President and CEO of CES), outlined his vision for future developments by the brand. One was the debut of Audi's  next-gen MMI Touch interface directly into a scroll wheel. The circuit board uses NVIDIA's Tegra chipset: the same processor powering a range of tablets and netbooks. At the recent 2011 Ford Explorer launch event, Ford folks spent the majority of our time talking about the new crossover's software infotainment features, not the hardware of what is essentially a redesigned 2005 Freestyle. But it’s just not the automakers that are pushing infotainment. Its new car buyers that making purchasing decisions based on not what’s under the hood, but what’s behind the dash. The new 2011 Volkswagen Jetta is a good example. VW kept the decrepit 2.0-litre 115 hp gas four available in the Jetta as a price leader. But customers would rather spend their money upgrading to the Jetta’s optional infotainment system. Becasue of this demand, my local VW dealer can’t keep enough of the hoary 2.0-litre models in stock. So while some may ask if one auto show is more relevant than another, perhaps the bigger question is: Are traditional auto shows still relevant at all?

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