How would Google change Detroit?

In this week's BusinessWeek, they ran an article that looked at how Google might approach the challenges of the Big 3 automotive companies in Detroit.  It was based on an excerpt from a new booked called "What Would Google Do?", by Jeff Jarvis.  I have written about this book before, but hadn't had a chance to read any of it prior to this article.  

After looking through the article, I was glad that many of the concepts aligned with some of the ideas I had written about in a previous Decision of the Week.

At first blush, the idea of open collaboration for product design probably sounds completely foreign to most people that work in industries where that information is closely guarded.  But as we're beginning to see with many industries, the pace of change is forcing them to look for more ways to solve problems.  I'd be interested to hear how my classmates think their companies could benefit from open collaboration with their customers, partners or even competitors  to solve their most critical challenges.