Volvo Cars won’t be showing any cars at Automobility LA this year. Not a single car will adorn the Volvo stand at the LA show. Instead, the company will be showcasing its vision for what a car can be.
“The industry is changing and so are the expectations of people who use cars,” Volvo says. “By calling the trade show Automobility LA, the organisers have recognised the disruption affecting our industry,” said Mårten Levenstam, responsible for product strategy at Volvo Cars. “We want to demonstrate that we got the memo and start a conversation about the future of automobility. So instead of bringing a concept car, we talk about the concept of a car. We will not win the ‘car of the show’ award this year, but we are comfortable with that. Because this is not a car show.”
Volvo will instead have a number of interactive demonstrations of connected services called the Volvo 360c concept. These services include in-car delivery, car sharing, autonomous driving ideas, and Volvo’s car subscription service Care by Volvo. The goal is to show not only what the future will bring, sans the cars that future will be moved around in, but also to highlight how much of automotive’s future will be outside of the car itself.
