Leveraging Car Connectivity in the Automotive Aftermarket and Beyond

The research objective of this article is to explore and enhance the general understanding of how automotive companies operating in the automotive aftermarket and beyond conceptualize and design business models and leverage platform ecosystems to capture value from connected cars. Since players in the independent aftermarket do not enjoy exclusive in-vehicle data access like original equipment manufacturers (OEMs), they have to rely on alternative technical gateways to access this valuable data source. Our article investigates the various archetypal business models that can be formulated using vehicle data. Subsequently, we focus on one particular archetype among these models. Finally, we adopt the perspective of OEMs and analyze Android Automotive, an operating system developed by Google, which is adopted by multiple manufacturers and holds significant potential as an enabler for future use cases in the independent aftermarket.