IMPORTANT NOTICE!
I’ve just spent the last few days at IAA Mobility 2025 in Munich, getting hands-on with the future. I had the chance to meet German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, test-drive some incredible new vehicles, and after experiencing it all, I walked away with one undeniable conclusion: the soul of a modern car is its software.
It’s a massive shift. If I had to sum up the entire event in one sentence, it’s this: At IAA 2025, cars weren’t just shiny hardware; they were living, breathing platforms.
A New Kind of Show Floor
The first thing that struck me was the energy. The most successful and crowded spaces, like the “Open Space” concept throughout Munich’s city center, weren’t the ones with cars roped off on pedestals. They were the ones where you could get hands-on. People don’t just want to look at the future of mobility anymore; they want to try it, test drive it, and see it in action. It was a powerful reminder that user experience is king.
Germany Is All In
You could feel a real sense of national purpose, too. Listening to German Chancellor Friedrich Merz speak, it was clear that the goal isn’t just to participate in the electric revolution but to lead it. He emphasized that Germany must lead in electric mobility, not lag behind Asia, and pointed to the event as proof of the “innovative strength” of the industry.
And it’s not just talk. They’re aggressively tackling the infrastructure problem with more fast-charging points on highways and innovative pilots for residential and even bidirectional charging. The message was clear: the foundation is being laid for an electric, connected future.
The Real Star of the Show: Software
But for me, the most profound takeaway was the undeniable shift in focus. The conversation has moved beyond just building EVs to creating holistic Mobility as a Service (MaaS) ecosystems. We’re now asking how autonomous tech can be deployed in services for everyone, not just in personal luxury vehicles.
The answer to that question, and nearly every other one at IAA, was software.
A speaker from Bosch put it perfectly when he said that future vehicles will “constantly learn by means of artificial intelligence,” and that software updates will never stop.
Think about that. The car you buy won’t be a static product. It will evolve, improve, and gain new features long after it leaves the factory. This is the heart of the software-defined vehicle (SDV). It’s a complete paradigm shift from hardware-centric engineering to a dynamic, software-first approach.
The Road Ahead for Us
So, what does this all mean for software partners and engineers like us at unicrew?
Honestly, it feels like the floodgates have opened. This year’s IAA Mobility made it crystal clear that the future of cars is being written in code. The opportunities for us are enormous, from building intelligent AI copilots and sophisticated digital twins to designing the seamless user experiences and secure over-the-air (OTA) infrastructures that will power this new automotive era.
Leaving Munich, I’m more convinced than ever that the future of mobility isn’t just electric or autonomous. It’s software-defined. And for those of us ready to build it, the most exciting part of the journey is just beginning.
