As journalists covering the automotive industry we spend a lot of our time talking to engineering consultancies and like Munro & Associates. There are so many firms out there you’ve maybe never heard of that possess a ton of insight and information. One of these firms is ITB Group, which also holds fascinating conferences with many of the key designers and decision makers shaping the next generation of cars. We’re excited to announce a partnership with ITB Group that’s going to start with the New Cabin Technologies conference after the Detroit Auto Show on September 15th in Novi, Michigan.

ITB Group is a major automotive consulting firm that’s tracked technical developments in the space for more than 30 years. If an automakers wants to know what’s going on with battery cooling systems in China or biofuels in Brazil they’ll often call ITB Group for an answer. In addition, ITB Group holds conferences throughout the year that bring the biggest and most influential names in various parts of the automotive world together to preview the future.

Typically, these kinds of conferences produce a lot of insight but it’s not something that filters down to consumers until those developments end up in vehicles. We’re working with ITB Group to help start to change that.

Jason Will Be Speaking At The Conference And Covering What To Expect Inside Your Next New Car

Our own Jason Torchinsky, who spends a lot of time thinking about the human machine interface will be covering the conference and attending presentations like Automotive Smart Windows Enabled by Lightweight and Biaxially Formable Tintable Liquid Crystal Films and Enabling Dynamic and Functional Lighting Integration through Genuine Materials.

In the weeks after the event, Jason will be crystalizing and reporting on a lot of what he’s learned and will be explaining it on this site. I, for one, am curious to learn about biaxially formable tintable liquid crystal films.

At the event, Jason will be participating in a post-lunch panel called “The Future State of the Cabin” that’ll include a discussion about the return of buttons, upcoming HMI improvements, and what it means to have a cabin in a car without a steering wheel. It’ll be awesome.

How To Attend If You’re Into That Sort Of Thing

Obviously, this is an extremely insider-y conference mostly attended by people in the industry. If you’d like to attend, it’ll be at the Sheraton Detroit Novi Hotel outside of Detroit on September 15th, after the Detroit Auto Show. You can register to attend here.

If you work for an OEM and have an OEM email address, like fionabickerton@lotus.com, you can sign up and attend for free. If you work for a supplier or someone else and are an Autopian Member, you can get a 10% discount on attending by using a code that was emailed out to members. Note: the conference is $845 so the 10% savings is actually more than what a cloth membership costs, so if you want to sign up just for the discount you can! If you do, email us and I can send you the code.

If You’re Not Attending It’ll Still Be Cool

Obviously, $845 is way too much money to spend if you are just casually interested, but we have a large number of industry professionals who read the site so we thought we’d offer the chance to save a little money. If you’re not going, don’t worry, Jason is going to bring back a bunch of great stories.

The hope is that, through this partnership, we can bring readers a lot of fascinating information that you’d otherwise not get access to in any other way.