[lamborghini]

Originally Posted by ramgkulkarni

4. One feature while purchasing a car that I would like would be to customize your variant. Imagine if you can buy a mid-variant and add/customize features from the upper variants. I would probably like to get the higher end variant of a car without the OEM alloys. The prices on OEM alloys just cannot be justified.
5. One more option is to choose the colour of your interiors, I don’t want options like tan, white and other colours like on the BMWs but would really appreciate if we are allowed to choose black from beige and vice versa. I have a dzire with beige interiors. After 4 years, I must confess that I need a change. A friend of mine’s has a swift from the same year and with black interiors, it has aged quite decently.

Sadly these above two points aren't even possible on most luxury brands sold in India (BMW is the one exception). Audi used to allow customers to choose their interior colour too once upon a time, but no more from what I've read on some A4 posts.

On a trip to Germany, I remember noting to a friend how the taxi drivers there have more customisation options than even a buyer of the S500 Maybach in India!

[blacklist]

A majority of the high end luxury comforts mentioned here are useful only for enthusiasts like us. India being a different market than most of the developed nations have a significant share of mass market players like Maruti and Hyundai, would take at least a decade to mature and most buyers out there shall appreciate these features in the coming generations.

[Queryanalyzer]

Originally Posted by androdev

Some features I can think of:
Good quality Android/iOS based head unit
Heads up display
360-degree camera
Fancy ambient lighting
Ventilated seats
Panoramic sun roof

- Yes, better phone integration would be great. A few months back I switched to Android for the first time (from iPhone) and guess what? I could no longer control my play list with steering mounted controls. Heck I need to connected the phone using the 3.5mm jack. I drive a 2012 Jazz.

- Rear-view camera may be. But in my opinion a 360 is unnecessary in a compact/economy car. And don't they need side-mounted camera? I cant imagine what would happen to these camera mounted side-view mirrors.

- 4-wheel disc. This may take a while I am afraid. Even the US market didnt have this as standard in the run-of-the-mill econo-boxes (Corolla, Civic, Focus..). But this was a few years back and things may have changed now.

- Standard airbags, front (2) and side
- Variable speed intermittent wiper, not just the one with 3 settings.
- And please, struts for the hood/bonnet. This is not the 80s to provide a latch.
- Decent sound deadening: Wheel arches, engine-bay. Our highway are getting better and with it the average speed.
- Oh also, power seats please. Just the driver side will do.

I often think manufacturers get away with providing the basics because the lack of awareness. But this is changing for better.

[Thermodynamics]

Luxury cars may have a fatty margin but they desperately need to differentiate in order to claim a premium.
Performance, comfort and safety of modern cars could not have improved to the state today unless these luxury cars made it viable for any new technology to cover their development costs.

Originally Posted by GTO

Android Auto & Apple CarPlay: It's amazing how many mass market cars offer this incredibly useful integration (e.g. Baleno), but so many 50-lakh cars don't.

A 35 Lakh Audi Q3 has only a manual AC while a 7 Lakh Baleno sports Automatic climate control

Differentiation is tough, the competition is not necessarily external such as the state of Audi who have to make the lower variants of Q3 with manual AC in order that they can differentiate the higher variants.

[King_pin09]

In my opinion, it has more to do with the Manufacturer’s unwillingness to add features to the car proactively until and unless it becomes a mandatory requirement due to competition and/ or customer demands. Even if any feature is added in the wake of the competition, few manufacturers tend to balance such additions by eliminating other “older” features.

One may refer the case of Ciaz and Honda City where both have been adding fancy features such as push button start, voice commands, foot-well lighting et-al while skimming on more functional features such as illumination to power window buttons, boot lid cladding, puddle lamps, etc. Despite having made these arrogant deletions, the cars sold well due to lack of a trend-setting competition. Now that the all new Verna is now boasting of ventilated /cooled seats (a feature now trickled down from luxury cars), no wonder City / Ciaz may also bring them in as progressive updates if the Verna manages to outsell both. Even then, the chances of MSIL/ HCIL making corresponding deletion of some another functional feature or even a drop in build, overall fit and finish, would also be plausible.

[Theyota]

Car makers are in business to make reasonable profits like every other business and not to do some kind of social service. To introduce any feature, it must fulfill one of the 3 criteria,

- it is needed for car to operate from A to B or
- it has potential to generate additional sales and therefore additional profits or
- it is required by law or some kind of binding guidelines in the market they operate in.

Without fulfilling any of the above criteria why would any sane business introduce a new feature?

It is the job of the regulatory agencies to make a certain feature mandatory. It is wrong to enforce some of the safety requirements that members of Team-Bhp think are necessary as mandatory requirements in a market like India. The cars would become unaffordable for a considerable portion of the market that would be left with motorbikes which are bigger hazards.

[teemus]

I don't know if this the right post for wishlist but one feature I would definitely like to trickle down is the Remote Start option. In US nowadays, majority of new cars come with this feature, which is particularly useful in winter; you remote start the car around 3-4 mins prior to when you are going to start and bring the interiors, seats and steering wheel up to the temperature.

I believe this will also be useful in India due to our hot weather; you park in sun in the afternoon, remote start it with full a/c on and enter the car which is at an optimum temperature.

Another feature which should trickle down is the Blind Spot Detection; to give visible/audible warning if there is a car or a bike in your mirrors blind spot region. I have seen this work in Nissan Rogue here and it is amazing and effective. We must definitely have this as we have very high number of 2 wheelers running parallel and close to the cars; mostly within the blind spot zone. More than anything this is a Safety feature and should definitely be prioritized over ambient lighting nonsense.

[headers]

My vote is for the Punto MID - one of the most comprehensive Ive owned, even better than my current Jetta and Verna combined.

I'd vote for ventilated seats as i often spend one third of my day in the car, and coming from Chennai, Im sure the reason is obvious

Also, generically, the European cars have more features [more complex to understand] than the Korean or Japanese ones. These two follow simplicity to the core and thats what makes them best sellers

[invidious]

Volumes bring down costs and thus it becomes affordable to offer both safety features and creature comforts at a lower price point. The biggest factor for this has been the movement of manufacturing to China and their slew of pollution emitting, labor intensive industries.

I would say the features coming down has not been a trickle but a flood. Look at cars from a decade ago - you would be hard pressed to find a car in the 10-12 lakh range even with Bluetooth integration.

Whether it is Android Head Units, navigation, reverse cameras, ISOFIX, dual airbags etc. - these are now offered even in sub 8 lakh cars. I have a feeling ventilated seats are next to be offered in quite a few models given their practicality in our weather.

[bkc]

Though features have trickled down, some features are skipped in a facelift:
- Rear disc and 6 airbags in I20.
- Thinner window glass in swift.
- Thumb fitting horn buttons (Though old, it's nice, like in m800, optra).
- Hydraulic Steering.

Apart from ABS and Airbags, some more basics should be mandated:
- Crash rating sticker on car, like the recommended air pressure sticker.
- Structural integrity of car.
- All wheel discs or a mandated stopping distance proportional to 0-100 timings of the car ( This takes care of skinny tyres too).
- ISOFIX mounts.
- Minimum required noise insulation, inside cabin.
- Mandatory Mirrors on both sides.
- Mandatory defogger for ORVM and Rear.

No, I'm not greedy, these are really useful ones and many cannot be fitted in an aftermarket.