BMW’s Tech Boss on Trade Wars, Alexa+, and Why Software Matters More Than Ever

The annual Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas is always a great venue for getting a look at what's next in the world of tech, the sorts of gadgets and services that are being developed to make our lives better, or at least more interesting, over the next few years. Tech pundits, journalists, and a growing swarm of influencers flock to the show every year, but they're not the only ones.

Representatives from every major auto manufacturer on the planet also stalk the show floor, some more visibly than others. "We have a lot of partners here, from Qualcomm to some other players. I'm interested in what is going on, the display technology and all the things," BMW's Dr. Joachim Post told me at the company's expansive booth just outside of the show's South Hall. Post is a member of the BMW board of management in charge of development. He serves as the company's CTO, and, prior to that, handled the company's supplier network.

"CES is always very important," he said.

At CES 2026, BMW was showing off its forthcoming iX3, the first entrant of its long-teased Neue Klasse line of electric vehicles. The iX3 is also the first car to include support for Amazon's Alexa+, making it the sort of consumer electronics AI mashup that was everywhere you looked at this year's show.

See All 5 Photos5

BMW Is Staying Flexible

"We're the first ones who have Alexa+ in the car. And very fast, after their launch of Alexa+ to their devices," Post said. But, dig a little deeper, and you'll find plenty of other consumer electronics powerhouses scattered throughout BMW's latest SUV.

"We need to be flexible. There's a lot of Infineon and NXP power," Post said. "Qualcomm is for ADAS functions. We have Samsung on the infotainment side."

Every major consumer electronics chipset manufacturer on the planet is presently making a play for a bigger slice of the automotive pie, and Post said that picking partners is only getting more difficult. That's because these days, it's not good enough to figure out which company offers the best tech.

Given the state of global tariffs and trade wars at the moment, Post is preparing for a time when cars might need a complete digital reboot as they move from one market to the next. "Geopolitics means you have to use different chips, maybe in the future, in China and in the United States or in Europe," he said. "The ones who have separated hardware from software, I believe, will have a competitive advantage."

BMW has worked with more tech partners, like QNX, to deliver that flexibility. In the software design industry, the concept is called a hardware abstraction layer, effectively a way of segmenting your applications so that swapping from one hardware provider to another doesn't mean starting from scratch.

Using the Right Tool For the Software

Think of it a little like designing an electric screwdriver. You wouldn't want it to only work with one kind of screwhead, so during the design process you'd specify a replaceable adapter on the end. That would make moving from flathead to Phillips to JIS to Torx quick and easy. The right software design makes moving from one chipset to another relatively trivial, too.

"With this new electronic architecture, from software and from hardware, we realized the software-defined vehicle. It's really important to keep the separation from hardware to software so that you do not have to renew the whole software once you put more computing power in," Post said.

See All 5 Photos5

That means, if BMW's engineers and partners do their jobs right, drivers won't know or care which digital engine is powering all those displays splayed across a modern car's dashboard.

"Our philosophy is to have the seamless integration of technology or function so that, for every customer, it's easy to say, 'It feels like I'm driving the car,' rather than 'The car is driving me,'" Post said.

Another challenge in implementing tech features like Alexa+ is that not everybody wants or even knows how to use them. But those who know and use AI increasingly can't live without it.

Getting Owners Comfortable with New Tech

Post said that having Alexa+ in the car means BMW drivers can easily use the same intelligent, virtual agent on the go that they might already be used to chatting with on their phones or smart appliances. In the car, that means going well beyond what a typical voice assistant can do, including getting detailed restaurant reviews and even making table reservations by voice.

See All 5 Photos5

"Not every customer is using it at the same level," Post said, "but it is important. More and more customers use this function, and they expect that they have it in the car."

Sometimes, those customers are even more knowledgeable than BMW's own salespeople. That's an increasingly big challenge as cars gain more and more features and capabilities in everything from infotainment to active safety.

Thankfully, BMW is not only training up its sales force, it's working to simplify and improve what Post calls "the onboarding experience" thanks largely to improvements in digital key technology. This will make it quick and easy for new customers to pair their phones and get driving.

See All 5 Photos5

It remains to be seen whether BMW can make that process as seamless as Tesla, where new vehicle handovers are typically completed in minutes rather than the hours of pain a typical dealership requires before giving you the keys.

Regardless, BMW will need to keep pushing the envelope, because while it needs to support a broad range of customers, Post said his company's buyers tend to be closer towards the bleeding edge of tech adoption than your average driver.

"Our experience is that they are more early adopters," he said. "There are always more tech-related customers in the premium segment than in the base."

In other words, exactly the sorts of people you find at CES every year.