Ownership to Access: China’s New Paradigm?

An autonomous trip to the airport in one of Jaguar’s executive cars. A weekend away in a Land Rover 4×4. A track day in a high-performance sports car.

These are all part of Jaguar Land Rover’s vision for a luxury automotive experience as they seek to innovative the future of mobility in China.

Consumers around the world now require a diversity of experiences to satisfy their growing wants, especially prioritizing personalization and convenience. This shift in demand is influencing individuals to change their consumption pattern from one of ownership to access. For instance, instead of buying a product, consumers will opt into a one-off payment for service or a subscription to a platform. Car sharing companies such as Zip Car, Lyft, and Uber have built their empires off the trend toward access, and this industry is shaping the future of mobility.

China Consumer JLR Ownership - Collective Responsibility
Photo Credit: EPA

But what is the Chinese individual’s attitude towards ownership?

With the growth of the middle class and rising wealth over the past decade, ownership was considered a status symbol, and car sales dramatically increased. However, in the past couple of years, China has seen the growth of more platforms based on access – especially in the transportation sector. Uber and Didi Taxi are now widely used platforms, and the recent ascension of high-profile bike sharing app Mobike further indicates that convenience and accessibility is of growing importance in user acquisition.

It seems that, for the first time, China’s unwavering commitment to ownership could be changing.

Is the new millennial generation set to drive the Chinese market towards an access-based system? What key factors will incentivize people to seek access over ownership? How can the vehicle experience be adapted and personalized to different consumer needs? What is the market for a luxury service?

These are all questions that innovators at Jaguar Land Rover want to understand when developing a new, elite car sharing platform. They are seeking out student millennials to develop insights into the market, and to ideate and design the ultimate user experience and journey.

It is for this pursuit that we at Collective are proud to present our upcoming hackathon in partnership with Jaguar Land Rover:

Hacking the Future of Connected Vehicles: the 2016 Jaguar Land Hackathon, on December 10th-11th in Shanghai.

Featured Image Credit: David Gray/Reuters

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