BMW Sells Subscriptions For Heated Seats

As the automotive industry increasingly looks at vehicles like software platforms, they are getting big into micro-transactions. We have already seen MG Motors deploy its car-as-a-platform strategy in India but things are a bit more evolved outside India. For example, BMW is now selling a subscription service for $18 per month in South Korea for heated seats. There is an unlimited option as well which costs $415.

This feature has popped up in many markets like South Korea this week but it is also there in the UK, Germany, New Zealand and South Africa but so far it hasn’t been seen in the US.

Since 2020, BMW has been touting its own operating system which will support micro-transactions for things like automatic high beams and adaptive cruise control. These updates have been loathed by users who have considered it an exploitive move as the hardware elements for all these features are already there in its cars and are enabled by software activation once a micro transaction is completed.

That being said, providing some of these features for the automaker can cause recurring costs. For example, automatic traffic camera alerts will need a subscription service. But then features like a heated steering wheel are also behind a $12 monthly subscription and $235 for unlimited use. For its iconic sounds sport package which basically plays a high-performance engine sound to the car costs $117.

This will be the trend increasingly even in India. For example with the launch of the Tata Nexon EV Prime, Tata Motors has hinted at chargig customers in the future for software updates it does for its cars.