Automatic smart driving monitor now connects your car to over 20 apps
Today, Automatic launches its new App Gallery of third-party apps and rolls out the second-generation of its OBD-II adapter.
Context & Ripple Effects
Automatic is turning a diagnostic dongle into a distribution channel. Its Glympse-enabled moment came earlier this year when location sharing from connected vehicles proved there was developer appetite for car data; the new App Gallery formalizes that, giving over 20 third-party apps a storefront hooked to the second-generation OBD-II adapter.
The timing matters because the dongle window is closing fast: Samsung's MirrorLink Car Mode and Android Auto are pushing phone-side integration, so Automatic's play is to own the app layer before the automakers and handset makers do.
First-order effects
- Existing Automatic adapter owners get an immediate reason to keep the device plugged in: the App Gallery makes the OBD-II reader an app platform rather than a trip-logging gadget.
- Third-party developers gain a supported path to vehicle data without negotiating with carmakers, with Glympse-style location apps as the template.
Second-order effects
- Rivals will copy the storefront model directly — Mojio launched its own apps-and-services marketplace for its connected-car platform within months, confirming that whoever aggregates car data wants the app cut too.
- Phone makers respond by moving the app surface into the head unit instead: Samsung's Car Mode and Android Auto's growing list of supported car models compete for the same driver attention the dongle was capturing.
Third-order effects
- If the pattern holds, aftermarket adapters get squeezed between two consolidating layers — phone-based projection systems on one side and, by 2019, Google opening Android Automotive OS itself to third-party developers — leaving dongle players as commodity data pipes unless they own an ecosystem.
- The structural shift is that car software stops being per-model and becomes per-platform, with the app marketplace, not the hardware port, as the control point.
The trend: Car connectivity is migrating from aftermarket OBD-II dongles with bolt-on app stores to built-in operating-system platforms that open third-party ecosystems natively.