I've long wished for a "slot your iPad in here" solution for this sort of thing. Sure it might not stand up to automotive grade punishment, but you can remove it when leaving the car in the sun and if it breaks it is easy to replace and much cheaper than custom parts (thanks to Apple's economies of scale).
I've worked on "Bring Your Own Device" concepts together with Honda.[1] There are plenty of wins for consumers in this type of setup.
Automakers have taken notice that people are using their phones for an increasing share of infotainment functions.
The tough, time-consuming parts are working through the supply chain to build out the connectivity and "happy coexistence" of phone and car. Also, I've yet to find a UX which blends physical, voice, and touchscreen controls while accounting for their strengths, weaknesses, and learnability. Tesla included.
Agreed. I'm a big fan of the cradle/clamp thing on the VW e-up- it's supposed to be a "cost saving" feature, but I think it actually works better than most centrally mounted built-in systems.
My girlfriend has a VW Up! and I think the cradle idea is brilliant. It’s not as good as the new Polo setup, but changing music/sat nav is so much better on an iPhone than it would be on a cheap integrated system.
To be fair, they technically already do when you take it with yours with you somewhere.
As long as the mounting plate is sufficiently isolated from the rest of the car's movement, they shouldn't need to suffer any vibration in excess of what they'd endure under normal use and transport conditions.
Of course, it's still a better situation for consumers: if the iPad does die, you can replace it that same day with an off the shelf part (or you plug your phone in for that day instead), it's trivially expensive compared to what head units of similar type cost (it's actually even cheaper if you can use a bargain-basement 50-dollar Android tablet instead of an iPad), and it's something that you can upgrade as you get the money to do so.
Plus, it also heavily discourages manufacturers from pulling a Tesla and refusing to start your car before you update the infotainment software, which is also a shockingly anti-consumer trend.
