
The Renault-Nissan-AvtoVAZ partnership is to use Yandex in locally-made cars for services like real-time navigation, voice assistance and music.
The partnership also opens options to gain direct access to valuable car customer data, more than what Apple Inc. or Google apps obtain indirectly through smartphones.
Bloomberg reports that Roman Chernin, Yandex’s head of geolocation services said, ‘About 20 million Russians use our app to navigate through traffic jams, putting a phone on a window-mounted cradle so we sought to build it into the head unit.’
Yandex.Auto, the search engine’s infotainment system, will be fitted into more than 2 million Renault, Nissan and Lada cars in the next five years.
andex technology has been installed in about 100,000 connected cars sold in Russia since 2016, including models from Toyota Motor Co., Honda Motor Co. and China’s Chery. Yandex also has deals with Volkswagen AG, Hyundai Motor Co. and Jaguar Land Rover, reports Bloomberg.