“Electric, connected, shared and autonomous” – it's a vision for the future of driving you'd expect to find in a slide deck from Uber or Lyft, or in the pages of an Arthur C. Clarke novel.
Instead, this dream was delivered by Steve Carlisle, President and Managing Director of General Motors Canada, at the opening of GM's brand new innovation lab in the Communitech Hub on Thursday.
GM is one of the oldest car manufacturers on Earth, founded when there were fewer than 8,000 cars in the United States. While older companies aren't typically known for their forward-looking vision, these days no one is looking further ahead than GM. Its innovation lab, called “2908 at Communitech,” is a nod to how the company sees the future of its business: 1,000 years from its 1908 inception, solving problems in a world radically different from our own.
GM’s innovation space features model cars demonstrating the company’s
evolution. See the full photo gallery on Facebook.
(Communitech Photo: Anthony Reinhart)
“I hope that this will be just the start of a fast-growing group of partners who will truly challenge us to lead bold change in the way that we think about, and carry out, mobility today and in the future,” Carlisle said from the podium at Communitech. “GM Canada is especially excited to be the first automotive company in Canada to establish a presence here at Communitech, which we believe is one of the very best places in Canada to challenge traditional thinking and to make things happen.”
GM has been facing persistent questions about why it hasn’t invested in Silicon Valley, where manufacturers like Tesla Motors and software platforms like Uber and Lyft have a large presence. Carlisle’s answer to the question was a surprising one:
“When Mark (Reuss, GM's Global Head of Engineering) was asked by the media why GM was not being more aggressive in expanding into Silicon Valley, he talked about just how impressed he was in Waterloo and Canada as an equally important – if not better – place to foster talent and change the automotive industry. And make no mistake, that’s exactly why we’re here: to innovate, to change the world, to make mobility safer, better, more enjoyable, and more sustainable for our customers. It's about innovation and disruption.”
Disruption, a word that tends to scare large, long-established companies, was embraced by GM as the theme of the day. “We need to disrupt ourselves” was a mantra repeated often by all levels of GM leadership as they explored the future of the automotive business.
“We expect to see more change in the next five years than we have in the last fifty,” said Carlisle. “With our 2908 at Communitech lab, we’ll knock down old approaches, we’ll experiment, find new partners, and boldly go where future mobility is headed.”
So what are the lab’s priorities?
“Some of the initial focus for Lindsay (Farlow, Activator for 2908 at Communitech) and her team will be to explore and experiment with advanced smartphone applications, autonomous driving technology, and new sharing services and approaches,” Carlisle explained.
But a company with a 1,000-year vision has plans well beyond smartphone development. In fact, its dreams go beyond the car itself.
(From left to right): Brian Tossan, Director, Canadian Engineering, GM Canada;
Lindsay Farlow, Activator, 2908 at Communitech; Steve Carlisle, President
and Managing Director, GM Canada; Iain Klugman, CEO, Communitech;
David W. Paterson, Vice President, Corporate and Environmental Affairs,
GM Canada, as they cut the virtual ribbon for 2908 at Communitech.
See the full photo gallery on Facebook.
(Communitech Photo: Anthony Reinhart)
Carlisle argued that GM needs to think of itself as a “personal transportation company,” using a multi-modal approach that deploys personal vehicles (like the e-bikes GM Canada is developing), public transit, and ride sharing to keep human beings moving efficiently through the world.
But Carlisle’s most ambitious offering sounds like something straight from science fiction: “to build a fleet of autonomous Chevrolet Volt vehicles” right here in Canada.
“We’re so thrilled to have you here,” said Communitech CEO Iain Klugman. “I think that this signals an important shift in this community and for GM, to be the first automotive company leading their innovation platform out of Communitech.”
Communitech’s corporate innovation model, which has attracted companies like Canadian Tire, Canon, Thomson Reuters, TD, Manulife, Deloitte, Fairfax, and now GM, has innovation centres around the world watching closely.
“Welcome to the ’hood,” said Klugman. “We’re looking forward to great things happening in this space.”
