General Motors Chief Executive Officer Mary Barra is steering the automotive giant deeper into artificial intelligence, software services, and autonomous driving to offset mounting industry pressures, even as the company’s traditional manufacturing of gas-powered SUVs and pickup trucks continues to drive its immediate financial results.
The company released its third-quarter financial results on October 20, reporting that quarterly adjusted earnings before interest and taxes rose 22 percent from a year earlier to reach $4.1 billion. Total revenue hit $50 billion, underpinned by the company’s strong light-duty full-size pickup truck business. Despite beating Wall Street expectations for the quarter, GM shares fell roughly 5 percent following the report, declining by about 10 percent by October 22 after executives issued cautious full-year guidance, announced a new stock buyback authorization, and detailed rising operational headwinds.
Chief Financial Officer Paul Jacobson told analysts that full-year headwinds from commodity inflation, logistics, and memory chips would total roughly $2 billion, including costs already incurred. GM executives issued a full-year adjusted earnings forecast of $12.75 to $13.75 a share, with a midpoint falling below the $13.41 expected by analysts. Meanwhile, the company’s board authorized a multiyear $20 billion share buyback program. GM had 849 million shares outstanding at the end of September, down from 904 million at the end of 2025, marking a reduction of approximately 6.1 percent over the first nine months of the year.
To help buffer against shifting global markets, international conflicts, trade disputes, and tariffs, automakers are increasingly turning to software-defined vehicles and digital products to secure future profit margins. During the earnings call, Jacobson outlined four core growth pillars: launching the company’s new truck line flawlessly to capture a rich product mix, unlocking additional manufacturing capacity for full-size SUVs and high-volume crossovers, expanding digital adjacencies such as OnStar, Super Cruise, and Defense operations, and actively managing costs across warranties, electric vehicles, fixed expenses, and onshoring.
Barra reported that deferred revenue from software and services rose 40 percent year over year. The company recorded one million new OnStar subscriptions this year, bringing its Super Cruise-equipped fleet to one million vehicles. OnStar generated more than $800 million in revenue during the quarter, representing a 15 percent increase. Its deferred revenue balance climbed to $6.8 billion—covering payments for services GM has not yet delivered—with Barra noting the company is on pace to approach $7.5 billion in deferred revenue by the end of the year. That figure remains distinct from GM’s forecast of more than $3 billion in digital revenue expected to be recognized over the course of the year.
On October 21 in New York, GM showcased new technology slated for deployment across both its manufacturing plants and consumer vehicles. The strategy features digital twins on assembly lines, OnStar artificial intelligence integration, and an ambitious long-term roadmap aimed at bypassing intermediate autonomy milestones to achieve occupant-free vehicle operation for everyday errands like grocery pickups and dry cleaning.
Sterling Anderson, GM’s chief product officer and a former director of Tesla’s Autopilot programs who served as the Model X program lead, outlined the company’s technological scope to an audience of executives and reporters. Anderson stated that GM is investing across the entire self-driving stack—encompassing computing architecture, low-cost radar, and frontier machine learning—to build a trusted system designed to allow every vehicle to eventually drive itself or its occupants anywhere.
As part of its digital push, GM unveiled a new OnStar AI assistant scheduled to debut via a software update on the 2027 Cadillac Lyriq, with expansion to other equipped GM models in subsequent months. The assistant will allow vehicle occupants to adjust cabin temperatures and map charging stops using voice commands starting with the phrase “Hey OnStar.” A companion customer-facing app is scheduled for release next year, featuring optional family-location tools.
The rollout arrives as GM navigates consumer trust concerns following a recent $12.75 million settlement over allegations by California authorities that the company unlawfully shared detailed personal data regarding driving habits and geolocation with data brokers without adequate consent. Ed Nightingale, vice president of digital products, told reporters that GM recently launched a dedicated privacy center designed to make opting out straightforward for consumers, emphasizing that features are activated only at the customer’s discretion and can be disabled at any time.
In parallel with its software updates, GM announced that its planned autonomous highway-driving system will expand from the Cadillac Escalade IQ to high-volume SUVs and light-duty pickups, functioning separately from the existing Super Cruise system that currently requires an attentive driver. While the industry has historically relied on the Society of Automotive Engineers’ defined levels of self-driving as stepping stones, Anderson criticized Level 3 autonomy as an awkward intermediary phase. He confirmed that GM is bypassing Level 3 development to focus directly on a fully autonomous system capable of operating safely without continuous human supervision, though the company acknowledges that regulatory frameworks, legal boundaries, and real-world performance remain vital hurdles before driverless errand runs become reality.
