Ford is slashing each the month-to-month and annual price of its hands-free driver help characteristic, BlueCruise, for brand new and present house owners in response to “buyer and seller” suggestions, the corporate tells TechCrunch.
The automaker introduced Tuesday that it’ll now cost $49.99 monthly or $495 yearly for BlueCruise, which permits drivers to take their arms off the wheel on pre-mapped highways throughout america. That’s down from the earlier pricing of $75 monthly or $800 per 12 months.
Ford can also be now providing what it’s calling a “one-time buy” possibility for BlueCruise. Patrons should purchase BlueCruise for $2,495 when ordering a brand new automobile and Ford guarantees to maintain it energetic for a minimum of seven years. The corporate says that house owners received’t need to pay one other cent after the seven years “if the service is out there.” House owners can not switch their BlueCruise subscription to a different automobile.
The value drop comes as BlueCruise is presently the topic of a federal investigation after two deadly crashes occurred earlier this 12 months the place the characteristic was energetic. A driver in a type of crashes was just lately charged with DUI murder.
Introduced in 2021, BlueCruise makes use of a camera-based driver monitoring system to examine if drivers are watching the street whereas the system is energetic. The corporate declined to share what share of householders have activated the characteristic. Ford’s change to BlueCruise pricing additionally comes at some point after the corporate introduced it’s providing a complimentary residence charger and overlaying set up in a bid to spice up adoption of its electrical autos.
