The rise of infotainment from high-end gadget to everyday necessity means automakers are fitting more stuff into cars than we ever thought possible, and here’s something that feels targeted at a specific type of person. Mercedes-Benz has announced that, with the right subscription plan, you’ll soon be able to take camera-on Microsoft Teams meetings in select models. You’re pulling that face at that statement, aren’t you? I don’t blame you.
While using a Mercedes-Benz to hop on a Teams call while driving isn’t entirely new, how the app works in select new Mercedes-Benz models is changing. As the brand states:
With this update, drivers can use the in-car camera while driving, allowing other participants to see them during a meeting. Given the brand’s focus on safety, the use of the camera abides by the laws of each country and has been approved for use on the move. To minimise distraction and maximise safety while driving, the meeting video stream turns off automatically as soon as the camera is activated. As a result, the driver will never see any shared screens or slides – and the camera can be turned off at any time.
Ah, so that’s what the selfie camera in models like the new CLA is really for. It makes sense that drivers won’t be able to see anyone screen-sharing while they’re on the go because doing so sounds incredibly distracting, but camera functionality only seems helpful for those working at organizations with a camera-on policy, and even then, won’t they know you’re driving?
Of course, being available on-camera around the clock doesn’t come for free. This twist on Microsoft Teams access requires a subscription to what Mercedes-Benz calls the Entertainment Package Plus, pricing for which hasn’t been announced yet for the American market. Given that the non-plus bundle of optional data-dependent services for cars with MBUX infotainment will run you around $150 a year, it wouldn’t be surprising if the full suite of digital services for cars with the new MB.OS system may run at or above that pricing once the free trial period runs out.
I must admit, demand seems questionable, at least in this application. The only people I could really see wanting to pay for camera-on Microsoft Teams integration in their cars are C-suiters, and most high-flying all-business executives probably won’t be daily driving CLAs. Beyond that, a car is kind of like a third space for a lot of people. A place to laugh and cry and jam out and make exasperated hand gestures at the poor driving of other motorists, not a place for work to rapidly encroach on. At 70 MPH, no one can hear how badly you’re butchering that Sarah McLaughlin track. Your housemates and/or partner and/or family won’t judge you for eating Long John Silver’s if you don’t bring it home and just eat it in the car in the parking lot instead.
Don’t get me wrong, the rise of technology and the advent of flex days or even working from home offer some amazing upsides. I wouldn’t be writing this here if it weren’t for that. However, we’re rapidly losing spaces where we’re free to be unavailable, where there’s no real expectation of filing that report or sending that email right now. Should we keep the car as one of those spaces? I reckon it’s not a bad idea.
Top graphic images: Mercedes-Benz
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With CarPlay Teams messages still pop up, but I never check them. Driving is me time (I drive a fair bit for work). Why on earth would I want to join a video call while I’m driving. I’m also assuming that it would probably go against every single Health & Safety policy
I’d sooner pay NOT to use Teams in my car or anywhere else, for that matter.
Some of my colleagues do join Teams meetings from their cars, but they just use a phone on speaker or existing Bluetooth connection. Nobody where I work is buying a Mercedes any time soon, but I should ask the guy with the Tesla if he can use the screen for Teams.
Maybe through the browser. It does Zoom just fine, but that’s a native app.
Given that much of Teams’ back end uses SharePoint as a pseudo database, this seems like a monumental CF.
I wonder how many of the car’s own systems can be hacked through the SharePoint server. Should we ask those hacker guys?
If MB has designed it sensibly Teams et al are sandboxed and can’t touch the automotive components. OTOH SharePoint has a huge vulnerability right now that allows hacking document libraries.
No ‘camera on’ policy at my employer, but with a 2 hour commute I’ve listened to plenty of meetings while on the road, and presented for a few while parked at a gas station. Android phone hotspot for internet, aux jack stereo input for speakers. Worked just fine without an in vehicle data connection or smart dash tablet infotainment system.
Of all the things I wouldn’t pay to use in a car I’ve already paid for, Teams is the most. I hate using it for free.
Does the MS Teams access in Apple CarPlay get turned off in this Merc? Because I’m certainly not going to pay just to have a camera I don’t need.
Teams is punitive no matter where you are but I guess it’s the same as having it a paid upgrade in your car: An answer to a question only a very few people were asking. In the Merc’s case it was someone at MB who desperately wants someone to pay extra for services in their car. For MS Teams in general it was corporate IT monkeys that needed a solution to everyone independently using Slack that they could control when we all went to work from home. It is a very poor copy of Slack with heavy corporate IT controls just like the other MS tools.
But yeah, sure let’s charge extra for that to be used in the car with your selfie camera just so they can get a picture of you almost hitting that pedestrian while trying to answer why your team isn’t filling out your TPS reports.
Did you get the memo about the new cover sheets for the TPS reports? I’ll get you the memo.
Just don’t come for my red Swingline stapler…
Stapler app is extra.
Weird. Teams has a CarPlay app (presumably Android Auto as well), and I use it to dial into the occasional work meeting while sitting in a parking lot, but I’ve never once thought “Man, it sure would be great if my coworkers could see me sitting in a car looking straight ahead!”
I’ve never worked for a company that required camera-on Teams calls. Can anyone share what’s that’s like? I assume awful.
It is.
There are a few directors that require it where I am. It’s fine. I work globally at my company and the US is one of the few regions that camera use isn’t the norm. I don’t mind it really.
If we’re going to work remotely (as I do) then I prefer it since you do pick up on non-verbal queues when communicating. It’s not the same as being in-person but it’s not bad.
However, I would never use my camera in the car and I have taken Teams meetings in my car before.
I am also wondering about the CarPlay/AA apps. Are they going to pull a GM move and stop supporting those? Or do they really think people will pay to have Teams access with their stupid camera? This is either monumentally stupid or there is more to the feature set than we’re hearing about. Though both of these things can be true.
I work globally in a fully remote role as well. I don’t mind cameras if I’m sitting at my desk, but I’m not turning it on when I’m anywhere else, and find it off-putting when anyone else does (like video on when you’re walking in an airport is just weird).
The real move is to integrate Teams in a way that automatically links to your workplace and make you pay to disable it. That’s how they could make some money.
Exactly, this seems less like a “feature” and more like a torture.
Huh, Torch was looking for new ways to incorporate cars into workplace scandals just yesterday. In-car Teams integration (with camera, no less!) seems like a good starting point!
People have phones and tablets, they can use them for whatever app they need on the road, provide a charger, that’s it.
But i guess car makers have no one inside the company willing to say a firm no to adding features, and no one is brave enough to embrace simplicity or even provide it as an option, their idea of simplicity is removing buttons and cram everything into a touch screen, you don’t want that? your options are very limited for new cars.
this is giving me a chuckle because this is a GERMAN car so imagine lady driving 160+mph on the autobahn on teams meeting and acting as normally as any American would be driving on a 55mph state highway.
“Well, boss, you knew I was in the car, but you really had to talk right then, so it shouldn’t surprise you that there was cursing.”