China AV Newsletter - Dec. 2020

I'm too many weeks late to release this newsletter that close 2020, though just in case you missed any of the exciting developments, I decided to still publish it. 2020 has been a crazy year for all of us, though during the end of it the industry recovered and just as we saw the momentum growing around SPAC deals globally, the Chinese AV applications are already on the streets! Autonomous fleets are deployed in multiple cities, including RoboTaxi, bus and trucks. The local NEV OEMs act as an industry accelerator, just like Tesla, pushing more and more autonomous tech into the vehicle and influence also traditional players to look for the best sensors and software providers. The newsletter begins with a link of a video we prepared to summarize all the latest development in the AV sector in China during 2020.

*If you prefer reading in Chinese or would like to share with colleagues – don’t forget that China AV Newsletter is also available in Mandarin via Weibo. All previous editions in both languages are also available at TheAutonomous website.

Enjoy~~

China AV Newsletter - Dec. 2020

Dec.1st: Horizon Robotics announced that the shipment of its autonomous driving chip journey 2 exceeded 100,000. Horizon revealed that at 2020, a total of six new vehicle models equipped with horizon chip will be launched or released, with sales expected to reach 160,000. Horizon hopes to hit the target of 1 million during 2021!

Dec.3rd: AutoX announced its first batch of RoboTaxi fleet in China, which is completely unmanned and without remote control. It also released videos of fully autonomous driving Robotaxi on busy public roads in Shenzhen. The fleet has a total of 25 vehicles, all of which are FCA Chrysler Pacifica. The vehicle is integrated with AutoX fifth generation sensor system, equipped with domestic LiDAR and cameras to ensure accurate perception at both hardware and software levels, coping with the complex urban road conditions in China.

Dec.10th: Xpeng raised over USD 2 billion by issuing additional shares. The funds raised this time will be used for R&D of smart electric vehicles software, hardware and data collection, as well as sales and marketing. Xpeng’s scale of additional issuance has increased to 48 million ADS.

Dec.10th: Baidu Apollo has released a new LEGO intelligent car solution. It hopes that, like Lego building blocks, it can reflect high quality on the one hand, and can be assembled and more open on the other. This means that each part of the package can be supplied separately. Apollo predicts that by 2023, more than 100 million vehicles will be equipped with Apollo intelligent AI.

Dec.11th: NIO announced issuance of 60 million ADS intending to grant the underwriters in the ADS offering a 30-day option to purchase up to an additional 9 million ADS. NIO plans to use the income obtained through the issuance of ADS mainly for R&D, sales, service network expansion, market penetration of new products and next-generation autonomous driving technology. Morgan Stanley & Co. LLC and China International Capital Corporation Hong Kong Securities Limited will act as underwriters for the ADS Offering.

Dec.11th: The "Special plan for the intelligent Internet-connected automobile industry (2020-2025)" lead by Shanghai Pilot Free Trade Zone Lingang New District Management Committee, was officially released striving to form a multi-dimensional and multi-field industrial chain system related to intelligent connected vehicles by 2025. In addition, the Second batch of autonomous driving vehicle open testing road in Lingang New District was launched. At present, the total mileage of open test roads in the Lingang New District has reached 118.2 km.

Dec.16th: DiDi signed a strategic cooperation agreement with Intel, aiming to carry out in-depth cooperation in cloud computing and autonomous driving based on DiDi's advantages in data services and innovation capabilities, as well as Intel's capabilities in brand, technology and ecology.

Dec.16th: Pony.ai was granted the first autonomous driving truck test license issued by Guangzhou City, and was allowed to conduct open road test. At present, Pony.ai has completed a number of complex scene test projects, including traffic signal recognition and response, avoidance, car following, Lane merging, overtaking, emergency parking, intersection and roundabout traffic.

Dec.21st: Huawei released its first LiDAR product, which it claims to be more in line with China's complex road conditions. At present, Huawei has established the first vehicle grade LiDAR Pilot production line.

Dec.22nd: From January to November this year, the share of new domestic forces in China's new energy vehicle market reached 14%, exceeding Tesla's 12% market share. Among them, the monthly sales volume of NIO has risen to more than 5000 vehicles, the cumulative sales volume from January to November has exceeded 36,000 vehicles, Xpeng Motors has delivered more than 20,000 vehicles from January to November, Lixiang ONE has delivered more than 30,000 vehicles, and WM Motor's EX5 has sold nearly 20,000 vehicles this year.

Dec.23rd: WeRide announced the completion of B1 round of strategic investment by Yutong group, the international mainstream bus supplier, threw out the largest single investment in the field of autonomous driving by Chinese automobile enterprises - US $200 million. After this round of financing, the two sides will promote the application of autonomous driving in mini-buses, buses, and other commercial scenarios. These will follow in-depth cooperation in R&D for vehicle platform, travel operation and other key fields for operation of autonomous mobility.

Dec.29th: QCraft started normal operation in Shenzhen and launched the first Robo-Bus monthly card in China. The Robo-Bus line deployed by QCraft is a pioneer Robo-Bus line in Shenzhen, with a total length of about 5 km. There are 10 stations along the line, running through the core locations of residential areas, schools, theatres, parks, and office areas around Pingshan station in Shenzhen.

Dec.30th: Great Wall Motors held an intelligent driving strategy upgrade conference and officially released the coffee intelligent driving strategy. "For intelligent driving, our ultimate goal is to enable drivers to enjoy a cup of coffee in autonomous vehicles." As a scalable architecture intelligent driving system independently developed by Great Wall Motors and derived from the coffee intelligent system, coffee intelligent driving has designed six redundant systems including perception redundancy, controller redundancy, braking redundancy, architecture redundancy, power supply redundancy, and steering redundancy.

Sources: Gasgoo; 36kr; cnBeta; AutoX; EqualOcean; Intel Newsroom; iFeng; TianYanCha;