Vehicle safety ratings are a huge factor in determining the success of a model when released onto the market, more so now than ever before. The inclusion of ADAS technologies into these safety ratings has pushed automotive OEMs to get with the times and implicate active safety systems into their vehicles, but what sort of effect do these inclusions have on the overall ratings? And why do we see far more 5 star vehicles than non 5 star vehicles in the current market? All of these questions will be answered in this insight.
The Past
In the past, vehicle saftey was a less important aspect of a vehicle and had far less impact on the success of a model in the market. Pairing that with active safety was seen as a premium, the star rating did not have as much of an impact on the success of a vehicle when seen through the customers eyes. But how has the industry evolved with regards to safety?
In the below graph we have shown how the industry average star rating has changed over the last 8 years from 2013.
This graph demostrates how the overall safety of vehicles released to market has increased from 4.4 stars in 2013 to 4.8 stars in 2021 and how well over half of all new vehicles tested are achieving the 5 star status. If we dive deeper into these ratings, an analysis can be completed on the industry at a vehicle segment level. This will show which segments of vehicle are, or are not bought based on their safety characteristics, and whether safety is a concern for all types of vehicles seen on the roads.
Below is a graph showcasing the change in 4 main vehicle segments over the last 8 years, with the timeline at the bottom indicating what period in time the chart is at in the annimation. Press the play button to commence the annimation.
If we delve even deeper into these star ratings, we can see how the industry has improved on an OEM level basis, this will allow analysis into which OEMs have improved the most, and which are still focussing on achieving that 5 star rating. The below graph showcases how each OEM has changed over the last 8 years, with the timeline at the bottom showing which year the figure represents. Press the play button to commence the annimation.
From this chart, we can see that premium OEMs such as Volvo or Tesla are generally at the forefront of safety technology and are focussing more on passenger wellbeing, having had 5 star safety ratings every year analysed. The biggest improvements are shown to be from mainstream OEMs such as Honda and Chrysler, moving from a low 4 star rating in 2013 up to a 5 star rating in 2021. The OEMs falling behind are pickup truck manufacturers such as GMC and RAM; like what is shown in the vehicle segment chart earlier in the insight, pickup trucks dont seem to have passenger safety as a key priority.
The Present
From the analysis completed, it can be seen that the relative safety of vehicles seems to be improving on a yearly basis. However, this might not be as true as it seems due to the stagnant nature of the US NCAP testing criteria. For the last 5 years, no changes have been made to the testing of vehicles in the US market largely due to the previous administrations deregulatory approach. This means that a car that achieved 5 stars 5 years ago, would still obtain 5 stars in today’s testing.
To put this into perspective, active safety is a key area that US NCAP has fallen behind in with only 4 active safety systems being tested. These tested systems are then not included in the vehicles star rating, but instead are used to provide recommendations to the OEM for future improvements. In comparison to Euro NCAP, 13 active safety systems are tested and are used to determine the star rating of the tested vehicle.
US NCAP is a long way behind in their present day testing.
The Future
The future for US NCAP testing does seem to be improving however, with the introduction of lane keeping support, pedestrian automatic emergency braking, blind spot warning and bind spot intervention potentially being used to formulate star ratings later in 2021. This change has come following the change of presidency to the Biden administration, who want to regulate active safety in the automotive industry.
Its going to be a long time before US testing is on par with other NCAP testing sites, but with OEMs such as General Motors announcing key safety improvements (Super Cruise) without regulation from NHTSA, the US looks in shape to gain back ground by the end of the decade. To learn more about the findings here or to set up a session with our ADAS experts to discuss the implications to your business, please contact us.