Pioneer and Pandora: 
Perfect Together

For years, Pioneer has been developing solutions and technology to produce the highest quality home and in-car entertainment experiences, and they've recently partnered with Pandora Internet Radio to enhance these experiences just a little bit more.

“The driving factor for partnering with Pandora was the fact that Pandora was moving into a leadership position in terms of consumer outreach, in terms of their growing base of listeners or users and they had a willingness to partner with us and develop an application that would work with our application. We had a common platform which was the iPhone, that allowed us to bring their services through the iPhone and ultimately into the dash of the car through two Pioneer radios, the AVIC-X920BT and the AVIC-Z120BT,” said Ted Cardenas, director of marketing for the mobile business group of Pioneer Electronics Inc.

Pioneer's focus right now is to demonstrate to their retailers, sales people and consumers how seamlessly this Pioneer/Pandora integration and how good the experience is to bring this world of Internet radio and this massive library of music, but be able to control it and interface it directly on the radio in the dash of your car. The company's audience and demographic just continues to grow.

“We are obviously looking at both technology enthusiasts, those that are familiar with smartphones and the latest and greatest in technology. We are reaching out to general consumers, technology consumers, car audio and car enthusiasts and also our retail base and making sure they're aware of both the technology and the service and how cool it is,” Cardenas says.

What features will you be seeing in the AVIC-X920BT and the AVIC-Z120BT? Well, in addition to Pandora Internet Radio and the built-in navigation capabilities, the AVIC-X920BT features 4GB of flash memory, a large 6.1-inch WGA touchscreen display (7-inch for the AVIC-Z120BT), a 3D graphics accelerator, DVD playback, built-in Bluetooth for hands-free calling and music streaming, USB connectivity for iPod/iPhone connectivity, micro SD card slot, backup camera input and is SIRIUS XM satellite and HD Radio ready. Each in-dash system also features Pioneer's new MusicSphere technology, which enables iPod and iPhone users to enjoy their library of music in a new way by creating unique, mood-based playlists that can be accessed via iTunes for their iPod, iPod Touch or iPhone device. MusicSphere analyzes the user's entire music library and creates 40 specialized playlists based on various musical attributes of the songs, such as feeling, rhythm pattern, Beats Per Minute and year of the song and/or date added to the device. Both are currently available for MSRPs of $1,099 and $1,599, respectively.

“Because the AVIC-X920BT and AVIC-Z120BT do have nice large touchscreens and the interfaces are completely integrated, it really is as close as you can get to having that same Pandora experience that you have in your home or your office right there in the dash of your car. It is the next step in listening in the car,” said Cardenas. EG