BYD reveals plans to ditch rotating infotainment screens
Words: Andrew Sluys
When BYD first arrived in New Zealand, the Chinese brand stole the spotlight for two reasons; its reasonably priced all-electric Atto 3 SUV, and infotainment screens that could rotate.
It was a feature not many people thought they needed, but the ability to choose between a portrait or landscape screen made it a familiar smart phone-like affair.
Unfortunately, it seems BYD’s rotating infotainment screens are being phased out, with BYD’s global executive vice president, Stella Li revealing this information in an interview with Autocar UK.
“If they want to give the best experience, then a rotating screen will limit their apps’ smoothness,” Li explained, referencing the landscape limitation when using Apple Carplay and Android Auto.
“And then secondly, we saw the feedback in the market. People love the rotating screens, but the usage is very small.”
This doesn’t come as much of a surprise, considering how both the Atto 1 and Atto 2 were announced for New Zealand with fixed infotainment screens.
In place of this rotating functionality it sounds like BYD wants to open its system up to app integration from developers such as Google.
It is likely that BYD is working towards a system where users can download a selection of apps. We have previously seen this across the infotainment systems in Volvo and Tesla vehicles.
