Navigating 2025 & Beyond

We predict that OEM requirements will increasingly specify static calibration of ADAS technologies, either in conjunction with dynamic calibration or as the sole calibration method. Performing static calibrations requires high investment in infrastructure initially; however, once that cost is met, static calibrations generally have faster turn times than dynamic calibrations and can be performed regardless of traffic or weather conditions.

ADAS calibration demand is largely determined by the market adoption of ADAS technology in the average model year of repairable vehicles. Comparing market penetration data from the U.S. Department of Transportation with Caliber estimatics, we can predict how many collision repairs will likely require calibration in any given year. The data indicates that by Q4 of 2025, up to 60% of collision repairs will involve at least one mandated calibration.

Caliber recently released a white paper on this topic.

Testing by industry safety experts has shown that two or more ADAS systems working together show dramatically improved collision avoidance versus those same two systems acting independently. The whole is greater than the sum of its parts. As a result, auto manufacturers are focusing their efforts on integrated ADAS technologies.

When vehicles are equipped with multiple ADAS systems, the likelihood of collision repairs requiring multiple calibrations increases. As ADAS adoption increases, collision frequency may decrease, but the impact of calibration costs on severity is expected to increase.

While much of the discussion regarding infrastructure support for the growth of electric vehicles (EVs) has focused on charging stations, EV drivers will also require market-level solutions for both vehicle maintenance and collision repair.

Caliber’s Marketplace Solutions Ecosystem offers the perfect solution: Agile, adaptable and scalable market-level EV coverage for our carrier partners and mutual customers. Brian Burbridge, Caliber's Strategic Accounts Senior Vice President, recently shared his insights into how the Marketplace Solutions Ecosystem can help your business solve for EV and other service needs at the market level. 

The U.S. Department of Transportation’s (DOT) National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) is aware of ADAS’s ability to save lives and prevent injuries. Federal regulatory bodies have started focusing on standardizing ADAS. They are increasing its adoption and ensuring continuous performance improvements. The first of these rulings, Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standards (FMVSS) 127, will significantly impact the collision repair and automotive liability industries.

Jamie Shackleford, Vice President of Caliber Marketing, shares an overview of how FMVSS 127 may impact collision repair and automotive liability. 

Manufacturers are demonstrating that with advanced head-up display (HUD) technology, essential driver information, including critical safety messaging, can be overlaid on the windshield directly in the driver’s line of sight—augmenting reality in real-time. This technology will affect both the collision repair and automotive glass industries, impacting repair vs. replace, repair costs, technician training and skills, and repair procedures.

The top 20 automotive manufacturers achieved their voluntary goal, and beginning with model year 2023, over 95% of the vehicles sold in the U.S. are equipped with standard automatic emergency braking (AEB). Over time, older vehicles will phase out of the range where collision repair makes financial sense. Eventually, when model year 2023 becomes the average age of repairable vehicles, approximately 95% of collisions will require post-repair calibration of at the AEB system.

Caliber’s whitepaper, mentioned earlier, covers these projections as well.

L3 ADAS is generally defined as the vehicle driving autonomously in limited scenarios, such as highway cruising, while the driver is hands-free but actively attentive and mentally engaged. Currently, only California and Nevada allow L3 ADAS, though the technology itself is not yet ready.

Should this technology test to be no less dangerous than driven vehicles in California and Nevada, it is likely that more states will allow L3 systems, and more drivers will purchase these vehicles. Collision repairers need to be aware that drivers will have higher expectations for L3 ADAS performance—requiring more exacting repairs and an increase in the number of calibrations performed.

In 2023, the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) issued a recommendation to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) to incentivize OEMs to include intelligent speed assistance (ISA) systems on new vehicles. In 2024, a bill to require model year 2030 vehicles to include technology that would discern speed limits and automatically notify drivers if they exceeded the limit by 10 mph passed the California Assembly and State Senate but was vetoed by the Governor.

It is plausible that in the projected future, automotive manufacturers may choose to voluntarily adopt technology that will notify drivers if they exceed posted speed limits. As with ADAS, drivers will most likely be able to disengage these systems, should they choose.

By 2040 there will be a significant shift in the demographic mix of American drivers. The entirety of both Gen Z (born 1997-2010) and Gen Alpha (born 2010-2024) will be of driving age. Both generations will primarily have learned to drive on ADAS-equipped vehicles. Additionally, the U.S. Census Bureau predicts that more than 1 in 5 Americans will be age 65 or older—an age where advances in vehicle automation will likely make driving easier and help keep drivers behind the wheel as they grow older.

Currently, ADAS L4 and L5 technologies are purely theoretical. However, we know they will need to leverage “vehicle-to-everything” technology, where the car’s ADAS communicates with other vehicles and the environment through location-based technology, potentially including radio frequency identification (RFID). We don’t know yet how this will impact collision repair, but it will likely involve entirely new repair procedures, which could impact the workforce in a variety of ways.