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Your New BMW? There's an App Store for That

by Amar Toor on October 28, 2009 at 08:15 AM


iPhone apps have permeated nearly every crevice of our daily lives. From the beach to the bar to the bathroom, there's an app for nearly every basic human activity. The only frontier left for Apple to conquer, it seems, is the daily commute. That, though, may soon change.

BMW has announced plans for a new BMW App Store, which would allow Beamer drivers to buy apps specially catered to their luxury cars. If it comes to fruition, drivers would be able to download apps directly to their cars' iDrive systems, either from their iPhones or directly from their PCs. Apps under consideration for inclusion into the BMW buffet include travel guides, geowikis, games, podcasts, Facebook, Xing, and Twitter. Perhaps most innovative, though, is a potential GPS-meets-iPhone experimental app that would sync your location to a site like Facebook or Twitter, then track your location, recommend great restaurants, and -- most importantly -- display fluid traffic routes as you cruise. More basically, the store would also likely include apps that keep track of gas consumption, and recommend braking and acceleration patterns to help conserve it.

It's a cool idea, and something that intuitively makes sense. We're just a little skeptical about Apple's ability to sell it, considering the Pete-and-Kate type relationship that cell phones and steering wheels have had over the years. BMW and Apple will almost surely tread softly in both developing and marketing the product -- just to make sure no one attacks it as an endorsement of irresponsible driving. If it does eventually make it to the market, though, we'd love to take some of its apps out for test drives. Hopefully, it would make those long holiday drives to the in-laws at least marginally more stimulating. [From: PSFK]

Tags: bmw, car, iphone, iphone app, top

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